African Violence and Diamonds

The international diamond community shares the anguish caused by the suffering of innocent civilians in the war-torn regions of Africa as described in “Dripping in Diamonds--and Blood” (May 12). The legitimate diamond industry views anyone dealing in illicit diamonds with disgust. Although this activity represents a negligible part of the diamond trade, it must stop. De Beers (which mines and markets the majority of the world’s diamonds) guarantees that none of the diamonds it sells come from regions of conflict. The U.S. jewelry industry is doing everything in its power to ensure that consumers can be confident that in buying diamonds they are not contributing to this conflict.

Diamonds are a tremendous natural resource and when properly managed can be the building blocks of African democracies. U.N. representatives and African leaders alike have stated that singling out diamonds as the cause of suffering could do more to threaten democratic diamond-producing nations than to alleviate problems in conflict zones.

JOAN PARKER, Director

Diamond Information Center

New York

*

Though not from Sierra Leone, I stay closer to its stories than most, as my wife is originally from there. The brutalities of that tiny nation have stolen the lives of both of her parents.

There is a shared ideology fueling the war in Sierra Leone: greed. This diamond-rich nation has spawned a gangster civil war in which children have their limbs casualty hacked off by machete just as a warning. Groups are friends one day and slaughtering each other the next. Once-revered and ethical tribal warrior societies perform little more than mercenary functions.

At the top of the heap, the apparently mad Foday Sankoh holds most sway. Though now it appears he is in hiding, kidnapped or perhaps even dead, Sankoh has made a mockery of the West’s political expediency and the U.N.’s toy-soldier diplomacy. His is the worst kind of warmongering, fighting performed purely for the sadistic enjoyment of the violence and the opportunity to accrue stolen wealth. Yet it is this man whom the West and the U.N. legitimized.

Europeans flee, impotent U.N. troops are held hostage and their weapons and vehicles stolen. The various factions will escalate their aggressions, spiraling into an ever-more-cruel and pointless orgy of violence. In the middle will be the disaffected, though powerless and innocent, general population, waiting terrified as the country is ransacked by the butchers who will most assuredly come again.

SHANNON JOSEPH CREAM

Chino Hills