Diamonds still bloody: 200 killed at Zimbabwean mine, certification collapsing

200+ killed by troops in Zimbabwean mine

Human Rights Watch said Friday that Zimbabwe's armed forces have taken over diamond fields in the east and killed more than 200 people, forcing children to search for the gems and beating villagers who get in the way.

See AP / Rights group: Abuse in Zimbabwe diamond fields and Telegrahp / Zanu-PF and Zimbabwe military 'profiting from diamond massacre'. The articles are essentially based on this Human Rights Watch report: Diamonds in the Rough. It describes how Robert Mugabe's regime in one case attacked mine workers with three military helicopters.

"I first heard the sound and then saw three helicopters above us in the field. I was not worried, I just assumed it was a team of buyers who had come for business in helicopters as they sometimes did. However, soldiers in the helicopters started firing live ammunition and tear gas at us. We all stopped digging and began to run towards the hills to hide."

Quote an anonymous survivor.

Army units are given turns overseeing the mine in an effort to keep troop morale from disintegrating along with the rest of the country.

Blood spilled over diamonds is far from a new thing. In fact, it was the theme of a 2006 Hollywood movie starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Connelly.

Blood Diamond - the movie

Imdb.com entry | Official site

Although, for my taste, it has a bit too much of Leonardo running right ahead of mortar explosions and mad gunfire it is a good movie in itself on top of highlighting an important issue. Good acting by Leonardo, Jennifer and not least by Djimon Hounsou who is playing the fisherman / mine slave. Theatrical, yes, but first of all gruesomely blunt in its violence.

From the final scrolling titles though we are given relief:

In January 2003, forty nations signed "The Kimberley Process" [...] It is up to the consumer to insist that a diamond is conflict-free.

2009: The Kimberley Process Certification Scheme collapsing

It might have worked for some years but now it's under serious pressure. Some in the industry argues Zimbabwean diamonds aren't blood diamonds as they fund a government. And 100% of Venezuela's diamonds are being smuggled, Guinea has reported an impossible 500% increase in diamond production year on year, in Angola thousands of small-scale Congolese miners were beaten and expelled and Lebanon is exporting more rough diamonds than it imports despite having no mines. No action has been taken against any of these countries still operating with Kimberley certification.

If the Kimberley Process collapses entirely?

The diamond trade would go back to its criminal past and rebel armies would have no problem finding buyers for their blood diamonds. The potential for diamonds fuelling conflict would be back.

Quote Ian Smillie, Kimberley Process initiative person - who left in anger

See The Huffington Post / The Return Of Blood Diamonds, africafiles.org / Partnership Africa Canada's Smillie casts final "no confidence" vote in Kimberley Process and goes home and The Globe and Mail / The failing battle against blood diamonds.

Throughout the history about Africa: whenever a substance a value is found, the locals died in great number, in misery. And this was truth of ivory, rubber, gold, and oils and is now true of diamond. According to a devastating report by Global Witness the stones are being used to process arm and finance civil war. We must act to prohibit the direct or indirect import of all of diamonds from conflict Zones

Quote G8 politician in Blood Diamond

Israeli attempt to divert water from Lebanon thwarted

Lebanese residents have thwarted an attempt by Israeli workers backed by Israeli troops to reopen a channel that would allow them to divert rain water form Lebanese territory, the state-run National News Agency reported.

It said on Saturday the channel was shut by the Lebanese army for over a year after it had caused damage to crops in the border Lebanese villages of Adassiyeh and Kfar Kila.

NNA said work stopped at the channel when a Lebanese army patrol, backed by Spanish peacekeepers, was dispatched to the area after tension ran high.

Lebanon: the environmental impact of the conflict with Israel

A year since the war between Israel and Hezbollah [...] in Lebanon, the consequences on the environment are still calamitous and putting the lives of thousands of people in the country at risk.

Source: Equilibri.net / Lebanon: the environmental impact of the conflict with Israel

• 70% of the South Lebanese depend on subsistence farming. But 90% of their arable land has been effectively mined by Israel's intensive use of cluster bombs.


• Wildlife severely harmed and tourism devastated due to extreme pollution of coasts and water resources.


• Article also details clean-up efforts.

From the Ecowar frontiers

Middle East

Around one-third of a massive oil slick caused by Israeli bombing of a Lebanese power plant remains in the Mediterranean a year on from war

Source: Lebanon still cleaning oil spill one year after war - Middle East Times

Arctic

Canada's increased military presence in the Arctic poses environmental dangers as bullets, shells, shell casings and other war-game detritus wind up in ecologically sensitive waters and tundra

Source: globeandmail.com: War games in Arctic draw fire over impact on ecology

Central America

Campesinos in the southern Mexican state of Guerrero have been blocking access to an area where the government wants to build a huge dam and hydroelecric station, since 2003

Source: ENVIRONMENT-MEXICO: High Voltage Conflict Over Dam

Asia

Bullets, grenades, bombs, mortars and other war tools obliterate wildlife, disturb native habitats and poison the air, water and soil with toxic chemicals. This damage to the environment is very costly and can persist for generations.

Source: Concealed casualty of war - INQUIRER.net