Harare: The Kimberly Process (KP) Civil Society Coalition has called on the diamond watchdog to classify Zimbabwe’s stones as conflict diamonds to prevent their sale on the formal market.

Natural Resource Governance director Farai Maguwu was quoted in a communique released by a coalition of the civil society organisations as saying that the army in Zimbabwe was involved in human rights abuses in the country’s diamond fields.

“The Civil Society Coalition highlighted the dangerous implications of the involvement of military officials in diamond mining or trading for national and international stability,” reads part of the communique.

The civil society coalition once lobbied for the expulsion of Zimbabwe from KP a decade ago following allegations of human rights abuses in the Marange diamond fields.

Apart from Zimbabwe, they also raised concerns about human rights abuses in Angola, DRC and Venezuela.

Meanwhile, the International Peace Information Service (IPIS) director Filip Reyniers proposed that the UN expand the definition of conflict diamonds to incorporate those mined with the involvement of the army in any given country.

“IPIS director Filip Reyniers presented on some of the lessons that can be learned from the conflict diamond issues affecting the Central African Republic (CAR),” reads the communique.

“These include the need to expand the definition of what constitutes a conflict diamond — a restriction that impeded KP intervention in the CAR to prevent a brutal part-diamond funded rebel coup in 2013.”
He said KP risks to focus more on continued trade than on peace and security-focused interventions, as a result of UN’s lack of deeper engagement in the diamond watchdog.

“It is time to move the KP beyond noble words. If the KP does not both reform and start seriously implementing existing recommendations, it will truly remain nothing more than a gilded talking shop,” said Reyniers.