Mugabe's Blood Diamonds - join in the debate
Have you bought a diamond recently?
Panorama goes deep into Zimbabwe's Marange diamond fields and and widescale killings.
As the international community argues over whether these diamonds should be sold on the open market, we ask if President Robert Mugabe will ever face prosecution for these crimes.
We welcome your views on Mugabe's Blood Diamonds. Please use this forum to leave your comment.
Comment number 1.
At 10th Aug 2011, Caley wrote:Good programme. I'm surprised that Panorama didn't mention the Chinese involvement in Marange or the airstrip.
Complain about this comment (Comment number 1)
Comment number 2.
At 10th Aug 2011, samantha wrote:Congratulations to Hilary Andersson for her brave and insightful journalistic efforts. As a Zimbabwean myself, I am outraged by the lack of action the international community has taken while many Zimbabweans continue to lose their lives and Mugabe and cronies remain in the lap of luxury and power! I found it interesting that investigative journalists know more about the situation in Marange than those powers higher up that claim the situation is fine...Thank you Panorama for reminding the world that Zimbabwe still exists and needs help!
Complain about this comment (Comment number 2)
Comment number 3.
At 11th Aug 2011, Sarah de Souza-Ingle wrote:I thought this programme was fantastic and really brought home clearly the truth about the situation with regards to buying a diamond in the UK. I was slightly disappointed that the end of the programme totally wrote off the possibility of a consumer being able to trace their diamond in the UK though. I agree that in the majority of UK jewellers this would not be possible, and that the KP is ineffective, however there are a handful of jewellers in the UK and US that are in fact able to tell consumers about the provenance of the stones they sell because they are either synthetic or they are sourced from Canada where they are mined, cut and polished with due care for the environment and for human rights. I recently bought a ring from Ingle and Rhode, a London-based firm who do this. Whilst I agree that the problems of African diamonds need to be brought to the attention of the public, I feel it would only have been fair to balance the report's conclusion that it is almost impossible to buy a diamond that is not a blood diamond with these facts, as well as some ideas of how the public could help with the boycott of these diamonds in the UK.
Complain about this comment (Comment number 3)
Comment number 4.
At 12th Sep 2011, Pierre Leblanc wrote:The diamond industry in Canada has a Code of Conduct that allows for the authentication of Canadian diamonds. For the authentication process, the Code Office will follow an audit trail all the way back to the mine where the diamond comes from. Their web site is at www.canadiandiamondcodeofconduct.ca. It is a not-for-profit organization endorsed by the World Jewellery Confederation ([Unsuitable/Broken URL removed by Moderator]) and more importantly the Competition Bureau of Canada [Unsuitable/Broken URL removed by Moderator]
Complain about this comment (Comment number 4)
Comment number 5.
At 14th Oct 2011, Jon wrote:A pretty sad situation. The Kimberly process is described here: .
There is good news though: "Over the last decade things have improved hugely with less than 1% of the worlds diamond supply coming from conflict zones."
Let's hope that continues.
Complain about this comment (Comment number 5)