Imagine you are jogging through Macizo Leone, a beautiful, lush panorama surrounded by tall trees throughout summer sun. Macizo Leone is actually a small country located on the southwest side of Africa? s coast that encompasses approximately 45, 000 square miles of tremendous mountain terrain, about 7% that is cultivable (Affairs 2010). The country provides a mixture of verdant rain forests, amazing beaches, plus more than half a dozen million people living within just its region. Then picture yourself travelling a bend over, discovering a large center of slaves focusing on their hands and legs in dull riverbeds searching for diamond jewelry. In addition to the varied foliage, Sierra Leone is additionally home to deposits of diamonds, titanium ore, bauxite, iron ore, gold, and chromite (Affairs 2010). To get Sierra Leoneans, these solutions, diamond debris in particular, had been a bane for they have been completely the basis intended for much turmoil and conflict. Because of their small size, gemstones can, with little hard work be transferred or smuggled out of the country and marketed into the dark-colored market. You will discover two types of diamonds in Sierra Leone: alluvial diamond jewelry, which are present in shallow riverbeds and kimberlite diamonds, which can be found in focused mines. Mainly because diamonds may be smuggled out of the country so easily intended for such substantial profit, they have become equally a reason to fight and a factor in creating revenue in order to obtain firearms and other provisions. One group who came to power as a result of their very own control overwas the Revolutionary Usa Front (RUF). Because Serranía Leone provides such a weak real estate rights regime over diamonds, rebels from your RUF seized full control of the precious stone deposits away from the government. This kind of seizure boiled over into a decade extended war between the RUF to ascertain who regulates the property rights to the precious stone deposits. The objective of this article is to evaluate the overall role of blood diamonds in Sierra Leone. I will initially present a short background on diamonds that will transition in to the role of diamonds in initiating, exacerbating, and eventually ending the warfare in Sierra Leone. Finally, I will end this research with a discourse on the post-war challenges Serranía Leone confronts in producing as a calm, unified country. Despite having some of the most amazing scenery in West The african continent, Sierra Leone has typically been described as one of the most monetarily poor countries in the world.
Because the discovery of diamonds in Sierra Leone in 1932, the country provides managed to foreign trade over thirty-two million carats of expensive diamonds (Hirsch 2000). Prior to the turmoil with the PRESTIGE, the precious stone industry was comprised of many corporate mining companies. Additionally to these diamond companies, Serranía Leone also used precisely what is called the Alluvial Gemstone Mining System (ADMS). Through this, little diamond suppliers were awarded licenses that enabled them to mine intended for diamonds, commonly using labor-intensive mining techniques (Hirsch 2000). The most common way for diamond exploration in Serranía Leone is the sifting through gravel by river banks, river gambling bets, and little pits (Conflict Free 2009). Unfortunately, nearly all workers through this type of operate have no title over the expensive diamonds they are unearthing. Because the diamonds mined through the Alluvial Diamond Mining Structure are ultimately sold through chains of small sellers to one with the corporate exploration companies being exported, the ADMS seems to have only two main functions:? to mollify, pacify, placate traditional rulers in the Asian province also to obtain diamond jewelry through labor-intensive, noncapitalist labor that could not really be attained profitably by larger businesses (Zack-Williams, 206).? The corporate framework behind the Alluvial Precious stone Mining System is completely outclassed by a firm named DeBeers. Through Lauren Thompson? s report Sierra Leone: 1935-2000, she explains how? in 1935, DeBeers gained complete rights towards the diamond sector in Macizo Leone before the year 2034 (Thompson 2000).? Later in her survey, Thompson talks about the part of Lebanese traders in Sierra Leone and their perceptions towards gemstone smuggling.? These traders quickly discovered smuggling diamonds helped bring easy profits, and dubious mining and trading grew throughout the country (Thompson 2000).? As soon as expression spread with regards to diamond smuggling, thousands of people flocked to Serranía Leone creating an overwhelming precious stone rush in 1950. Due to new influx of people, the government was no longer able to police the diamond districts (Abdullah 1998). In the end, with the govt completely taken from the diamond industry and also the diamonds getting dispersed above such a huge territory, expensive diamonds were right now seen as a great that could be socially looted, getting the object of conflict in Sierra Leone.
The diamond conflict in Sierra Leone is often credited to Charles Taylor, the former President of Liberia. Taylor is known to have got directly subsidized diamond brigands in Macizo Leone. Following illegal attainment of diamonds, these same brigands were after that responsible for smuggling the gemstones across the line into Liberia. In an document concerning local peacekeeping in Sierra Leone, Steven Burgess states that? The failure of the United States to reply to pleas from its classic Liberian number one ally during the disintegration of the dictatorship of Samuel Doe in 1990 acceptable a rebel incursion to escalate right into a protracted turmoil, subsequently, this spilled above into Sierra Leone, a similarly fragile state? (Burgess 1998, 41). The decade-long war in Sierra Leone is greatly linked to Taylor? s activities in funding diamond brigands and presenting the ability to finance war through diamond smuggling.
In addition to Taylor? s actions in nearby Liberia, conflict was also inspired by a large international link. The monopolistic control of diamond jewelry dug in Africa plus the world in general is out dated all the way back in the initial breakthrough of diamonds in The southern area of Africa back in the 1800s (Hirsch 2000). Through careful social construction, diamond companies just like DeBeers have managed to infuse the idea that expensive diamonds are really worth fighting for (Stanton 2002).? De Drinks is able to preserve high precious stone prices by buying up control over the world? h diamond items and controlling the amount found, also enabling the corporation to weather dips in the value of completed diamonds (Ariovich 1985).? Advertising and marketing also leads to raising the significance of something if they are so plentiful. Slogans just like? a diamonds is permanently? represent the idea that engagement bands not only need to have a gemstone as the stone, but in reality serve as a symbol for prosperity and cultural status for any couple (Epstein 1982). The final aspect dealing with diamond prices influencing issue is the difference in cost between completed and tough diamonds. Astonishingly, finished expensive diamonds, that is, expensive diamonds that have been cut and lustrous, sell for a dramatically bigger price those of rough diamonds coming out of poor countries including Sierra Leone.? The value of full sales of polished diamond jewelry can enhance to many occasions the value of stones in its difficult form. As an example, retail benefit of precious stone sales in 1981 totaled $18. zero billion, as the value of rough diamonds sold was probably simply around $2. 0 billion dollars (Ariovich 1985).? In this system, countries like Sierra Leone are not the ones receiving the income for diamond sales. It is corporate corporations like DeBeers who happen to be exploiting cheap labor, driving a car up the price of expensive diamonds, and creating conflict and war involving the rebel group RUF as well as the Sierra Leonean government.
Discord originally started out in 1990 when Foday Sankoh, an ex corporal inside the government armed service, forcibly asserted control over a team of young young boys who were protesting the installation of charges for participating in government schools (Abdullah 1998) Build using this initial number of children, Sankoh began building the foundation to get the PRESTIGE in the form of a kid army comprised of both male and female competitors. Recruitment methods used by the RUF generally included intimidating young children and teens that if they did not become a member of the RUF, their friends and family would be raped and slain in their presence. Once kids were inducted into the PRESTIGE, teen military were intentionally injected with cocaine, transforming their emotional reasoning and creating a sense of commitment to the PRESTIGE (Kandeh 2005). Children had been brainwashed in leading raids against the very villages in which they when lived. Finally the PRESTIGE ravaged the country, raping and killing whilst abducting new children for their cause.
Dégradation was a solid tool employed by the PRESTIGE as a means to control the public. In order to quit people by voting, the RUF began cutting off hands if people even considered voting. Because Kate Fogelberg and Alexandra Thalman make clear in their document, Amputation like a Strategy of Terror in Sierra Leone, terror tactics such as amputation were used in order to displace persons away from diamonds deposits, allowing the PRESTIGE full control of the souterrain (Fogelberg & Thalmann 2004). Child soldiers accounted for almost all of the workers during these diamond mines controlled by the RUF. One significant aspect of the partnership between RUF leaders and the child military is the dedication created between one another. Additionally to horror tactics and cocaine, PRESTIGE officers typically provided? surrogate? patrons? with their? client? kid soldiers, changing the very same patron-client relationship they will claimed to be fighting (Murphy 2003).?
In 1991, after the RUF had previously done substantive amounts of problems for Sierra Leonean society, Chief executive Momoh expected that peacekeepers be submitted an attempt to form peace between the government and the RUF. History shows that local organizations just like the SADC in South Africa and the ECOWAS in Nigeria had been more ready to aid Macizo Leone in their struggle whilst major pushes like the Usa and the United Nations steered obvious from the deal with (Burgess 1998). When calm attempts did not get the PRESTIGE to produce, ECOMOG soldiers began a military campaign to push the PRESTIGE to back off. However , just as the Sierra Leonean armed service had available to them, the ECOMOG forces had been unsuccessful within their efforts.
The civil battle between the RUF and the federal government of Serranía Leone overtook five many years to a long term close. Several attempts were made by Serranía Leone to find ways to end the conflict. It happened in 1999, war was temporarily stopped through the signing of the Lom? Peace Conform. Through this, Sankoh, the RUF leader, was granted the position of vice president in the Sierra Leonean government and give us a call at for worldwide peacekeepers to increase control the problem (Schaeffer 2007). The primary two forces that aided Sierra Leone in this were the United Nations and ECOMOG. However , when peacekeeping forces started out pulling out in 2000, the RUF started violating the Lom? Serenity Accord, most notably killing up to twenty people in one demonstration (Prosecuting Foday Sankoh 2000). Accordingly, chief members of the RUF had been arrested when Sankoh was stripped of all governmental electricity. Following this occurrence, while the disarmament and malfunction of the RUF continued to advance, the government commenced reasserting control of areas which were previously manipulated by RUF forces. Whilst rebel makes continue to cause destruction in Sierra Leone today, upon January 18, 2002, President Kabbah declared the city war between RUF to get officially more than (Pugh ainsi que al 2004).
Post-Conflict creation and the cultural implications due to the conflict in Serranía Leone continue to be a important issue for all members that society. The social effects of the battle alone are enough to severely cripple the country. Following a civil conflict, Sierra Leone experienced a big influx of orphans, many of who served with the PRESTIGE as combatants. With the PRESTIGE expelled, these kinds of children must now live side by side while using very people they once terrorized, raped and murdered (Azar ainsi que al 1999). The fact that previous combatants and subjects are living side-by-side in this unstable economy allows for a high risk for upcoming conflict. Even though most kid soldiers weren’t punished because of their actions as a result of recruitment methods by the PRESTIGE, there is nonetheless a high dependence on restorative rights that provides a feeling of community and calm to get both victims and combatants (Peters and Richards 1998).
In addition to social growth that needs to take place, economic development is also necessary to prevent future conflict. In line with the World Traditional bank, in order to build a sustainable economic climate that will stop future battle in a post-war country is the diversification of GDP away from one certain commodity or good (World Bank). Pertaining to Sierra Leone, this commodity is without a doubt diamond jewelry. However , in the event Sierra Leone decided to decrease its dependence on income in the sale of diamonds, the government may not receive practically as much revenue because a whole lot of Serranía Leone? t resources will be diamonds. Also, steps will have to be taken to law enforcement officials the gemstone fields if they were not mined since heavily in order to prevent the looting and fermage of gemstone deposits by yet another rebel incursion. Overall, the improved opportunity cost of not depending so much upon revenue made from the advertising of hard diamonds is a testament to just how difficult the conditions are currently becoming faced by the government of Sierra Leone.
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