Brisbane: The Australian Friends of Palestine Association (AFOPA), an organisation working for a just peace in Palestine and Israel, called on delegates to the Kimberley Process Certification Scheme (KPCS) currently meeting in plenary in Brisbane, 9-14 December 2017, to:
- Seal the gaping hole in the KPCS regulations, which facilitates the trade in blood diamonds that fund rogue regimes guilty of grievous human rights violations.
- Abolish the bogus System of Warranties introduced by the World Diamond Council (WDC), which purports to guarantee a diamond is conflict-free.
- Extend the remit of the KPCS to include cut and polished diamonds and not just rough diamonds.
Despite claims from vested interests in the jewellery and diamond industries that “conflict diamonds” have been “virtually eliminated form the legitimate supply chain” other blood diamonds that fund regimes accused of war crimes, crimes against humanity, the crime of apartheid and the development of unregulated nuclear weapons account for over 20 percent of the market share in value terms.
The repeated refusal of delegates to successive plenary meetings of the KPCS to broaden the definition of a “conflict diamond” means the diamond industry remains tarnished by bloodshed and violence. Rogue regimes are holding the global industry hostage in order to shield themselves from sanctions. This situation cannot be allowed to continue. The KPCS must amend the voting system, which gives veto power to corrupt, and violent regimes that use revenue from the diamond industry to murder, maim and terrorise populations under their control.
We note with concern the call this week from the World Diamond Council (WDC) for limited reform of the KPCS which excludes extending its remit to human rights violations associated with trading centres, as was originally proposed by the WDC in 2015 but was blocked by the president of the Israeli Diamond Exchange, Schmule Schnitzer, because “it could be disastrous to trading centres, especially to Israel”.
Revenue from cut and polished diamonds is a major source of funding for the Israeli military which stands accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity by the UN Human Rights Council, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch.
Spokesperson for AFOPA, Dr David Faber said, “It is incumbent on the jewellery industry to ensure consumers are not being conned into buying blood diamonds whitewashed by a matrix of bogus warranties, certification schemes and standards which ignore the human rights violations being funded from diamond revenue generated downstream of the mining sector”.
The KPCS is unfit for purpose as it gives a free pass to blood diamonds that fund human rights violations by government forces. Until regulations are amended to ban all blood diamonds consumers should consider if their need for a diamond is worth all the pain and suffering, which the industry inflicts on others less fortunate than themselves.
