Harare: Zimbabwe is said to have “renewed” its hostility towards Western nations on the sale of the country’s diamonds.
VOA Studio 7 reports that Zimbabwe’s Resource Exploitation Watch chairman, Tafadzwa Musarara, and some government insiders had accused the West, at a Kimberley Process intercessional plenary in Angola, of trying to block trade in Zimbabwean diamonds.
The West and the human rights organizations are said to have claimed that Marange diamonds had been laundered through the sale of diamonds in the United Arab Emirates.
A report on the global diamond trade published in 2013 by the World Policy Institute allegedly exposed how illicit and corrupt deals, facilitated by international groups was resulting in the plundering of Zimbabwe’s diamonds, VOA Studio 7 reports.
Musarara was quoted as saying that Western nations were trying hard to push for that report to be tabled and for Zimbabwe to be sanctioned.
However, Partnership Africa Canada research director Allan Martin said Zimbabwe was exaggerating its claims of victimization.