The moves to stamp out trade in "conflict" gems were ostensibly aimed at the operations of the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) in Sierra Leone and the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), antigovernment guerrilla organizations. Legislation is also being drafted in the U.S. Congress to require Customs to enforce a ban on stones from Liberia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Angola, Ivory Coast, Burkina Faso, and those from Sierra Leone that do not carry an official government certificate.

On August 9, the UN Security Council gave its nod to a plan by the Sierra Leonean government to establish a procedure to certify the origin of diamonds, clearing the way for the imperialist powers to allow the African nation to export its gems again--under the watchful eye of a UN-appointed "sanctions committee."

The De Beers diamond cartel, which controls two-thirds of the $7 billion yearly trade in uncut diamonds and owns half the producing mines, has joined the chorus against what are sanctimoniously called "blood diamonds," claiming it will not buy such stones and urging that all diamonds sold worldwide be attached to certificates of origin.

A number of liberal groups, most prominently Global Witness in London, have helped shape this campaign against the trade in "illegally" mined gems, which they say fuels wars on the African continent.

A closer look, however, demonstrates that this hullabaloo is not about halting wars and other conflicts in Africa--many of which the U.S., British, and French governments are deeply involved in. It is about advancing imperialist interests on the continent--and protecting the De Beers diamond cartel.  
 
De Beers: pillar of apartheid rule
De Beers, based in South Africa and the United Kingdom, has dominated the world diamond trade for more than a century. Its ownership structures are closely bound up with those of the Anglo American Corp., the vast South African conglomerate, of which it owns about 40 percent.

Both companies raked in massive profits from the labor of superexploited Africans driven off their land and into the mines, starting at the end of the 19th century. Later this brutal system was codified under apartheid white-minority rule. Both companies were bastions of support for the racist regime.

Diamonds were discovered in 1867 near Kimberley, South Africa, which became the source of the De Beers empire. It was no coincidence that Kimberley was also the birthplace in 1876 of South Africa's notorious pass laws--and mass trials of Africans for violating them--as De Beers and other mining capitalists sought to brand labor in a black skin as rightless.

De Beers was founded by Cecil Rhodes, the infamous British colonizer. By the opening of the 20th century, De Beers controlled 90 percent of the international diamond trade. In response to falling prices during the depression of the 1930s, the company initiated a policy of buying up virtually all diamonds mined worldwide and bolstering its fortunes through monopoly pricing of the rock, which is mostly sold as a luxury jewelry item. De Beers today dominates the diamond trade not only through mining, but through its Diamond Trading Company, until recently called the Central Selling Organization, which controls most of world output.

Today, with much fanfare, the big-business press is proclaiming that De Beers is changing how it operates. "The South African mining group is surrendering its monopoly position by giving up its traditional role of 'buyer of last resort' of every stone on the market," the Financial Times stated in July. "The buyer-of-last-resort strategy worked brilliantly in times of high inflation when diamond prices were high and the value of the stockpile rose. But low inflation and the emergence of new players have taken a heavy toll on the group. De Beers spent billions of dollars accumulating a large stockpile of diamonds that were never sold."

De Beers has used its stockpile to absorb diamonds on the market that might lower the price of the stone. Its new strategy is to buy up more mines, particularly in Australia and Canada, and to become the "supplier of choice"--meaning that it will aim to continue dominating diamond sales through its brand. By promoting itself as a seller of "clean" diamonds, the cartel aims to reinforce its monopoly, not to end it.

"Having spent hundreds of millions of dollars on advertising this product, De Beers is deeply concerned about anything that could damage the image of diamonds as a symbol of love, beauty, and purity," the company said in U.S. Congressional testimony.  
 
Diamond cartel control slips in Africa
In recent years the cartel has lost control of diamonds produced in several African countries. It is the weakening of its grip that prompts De Beers to support quarantining diamonds it does not control. If the cartel is broken, the price of diamonds will nosedive.

Last year De Beers withdrew from Ango-la, which holds 10 percent of known diamond reserves. After Washington began to withdraw visible support from UNITA in the early 1990s, De Beers' business there became more of a liability, especially when it came to light that it was buying diamonds produced in UNITA-controlled areas to protect the market price. It was also losing control over more and more of Angolan production.

In the Democratic Republic of Congo, site of 8 percent of known diamond reserves, control has also spun away from the cartel. In Sierra Leone, production from RUF-controlled areas eludes the De Beers buying operation. Last December the company closed its purchasing offices in West and Central Africa.

The company is also fighting to hold onto its monopoly rights to distribute diamonds produced in Russia, which holds 26 percent of known reserves.

"De Beers' strategy on conflict diamonds is motivated by more than just fears of a consumer boycott. Critics say the company has deftly turned the issue from a potential public relations disaster into a strategy to retain its market dominance," stated a Financial Times article. "They argue that if De Beers can position itself as a producer and distributor of 'clean diamonds,' it will keep a tight grip on the market without the expense of maintaining a stockpile."

Washington and London are building up "conflict diamonds" as an issue to bolster their ability to intervene--militarily and otherwise--in a range of African countries, from Sierra Leone to the Congo.  
 
U.S. and British intervention in Africa
The imperialist powers, posturing as defenders of peace, take full political advantage of the brutal conduct of forces such as the RUF of Sierra Leone and its ally, the regime of Liberian president Charles Taylor, to press their interests in the region. Those interests include having unfettered access to mineral resources and establishing stable, pliant regimes.

Earlier this year, British and other troops under the UN banner deepened their intervention in Sierra Leone when the imperialist-backed regime there made an effort to seize control of the diamond fields under RUF control.

On July 31, Washington's UN ambassador, Richard Holbrooke, compared the Liberian president, who has backed the RUF, to Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic, evoking the specter of the U.S. military intervention against Yugoslavia. "Taylor is Milosevic in Africa with diamonds," Holbrooke told the New York Times. "He is threatening to destabilize western Africa."

That same day, British diplomat Stephen Pattison told a UN hearing on "conflict gems" that, in return for diamonds, Burkina Faso president Blaise Compaore has sent mercenaries to fight alongside RUF rebels in Sierra Leone against UN troops.

Virginia Republican congressman Frank Wolf, a sponsor of the measure before the House of Representatives on banning certain African diamonds from the United States, declared that "until the link between diamonds and war is severed, these African wars will not end."

The sermons about diamonds bankrolling "African wars" are a smoke screen for the imperialist scramble to loot and politically dominate hunks of the continent.

The reactionary UNITA outfit, for example, was long financed and organized by the U.S. government and the apartheid regime in South Africa. As the Angolan people won their independence from Portugal in 1975, UNITA launched a civil war--backed by Washington and Pretoria--to prevent the coming to power of a government led by the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA). Successive attempts to overturn the MPLA government--including armed invasions by apartheid's troops--were smashed with the decisive assistance of Cuban internationalist troops, who fought alongside the Angolan army. Today, UNITA's uses have dwindled and Washington has withdrawn its most overt support.

In Sierra Leone, mining "legitimate" diamonds means mining under imperialist control. A colony of Britain until 1961, the country is rich in mineral resources, including diamonds and gold. Its major trading partners are Britain and the United States. In 1930, when diamonds were discovered, the British colonial government tried to seal off the region and made diamond mining illegal except for government-sponsored private monopolies and a few small licensing schemes, with the vast majority of the wealth leaving the country.

In the resource-rich Democratic Republic of Congo, fighting between rebel forces and the regime of Laurent Kabila is also unsettling the imperialist powers. For this reason the UN Security Council has voted to support a troop deployment in that country.

De Beers may sing the praises of "legitimacy", or even the "love, beauty and purity" of its diamonds today, but these were not its concerns as it mined in apartheid South Africa, apartheid-ruled Namibia, or colonial Angola, Congo, and Sierra Leone. Nor were Washington, London, Paris, and Brussels upset by these activities, which made huge fortunes in the imperialist capitals. But apartheid and colonial rule have been overturned in Africa--and a diamond cartel is not forever.