conclusions

Based on the research and the conclusions drawn from this research, The following recommendations can be made:

1. Trade statistics should become more useful to detect indirect imports or smuggling of conflict diamonds. Changing classification can not be permitted to be used as a loophole to import conflict diamonds. Therefore, trade statistics and definitions of rough diamonds, including industrial diamonds should be standardised. All trade statistics should include information about the country of origin alongside the country of provenance. Governments should require all diamond dealers to declare the country of origin of their products.
2. Before, or at the latest at the time of introducing a world-wide certification system of rough diamonds, the Kimberley process should institute an international database with standardised statistics on imports and exports of rough diamonds to and from all countries with information on (stockpiling) diamond reserves. This database should be made available online to all government. Citizens should have easy access to regular publications of these statistics.
3. All national governments should allocate enough resources to analyse the available trade data and enact upon anomalies. An international independent monitoring system should verify the (standardised) data, and have the capacity to investigate whether exports of conflict diamonds are being diverted to "sensitive countries" or to other countries with lax import controls. These efforts should be supported by the development of computerised systems to detect conflict or smuggled diamonds and identify important loopholes in the use of certificates of origin.
4. The lack of transparency on how UN resolutions are implemented, as experienced with the UK and the Netherlands in these reports, needs to be addressed to allow external scrutiny of the measures in place. The responses to the Kimberley Process questionnaire should be fully published with information broken down by country, and not just made available in an aggregate format.
5. The UK should urgently reinforce its mechanisms of border control and verification of certificates given the significant amount of rough imports. It should examine and operate useful inspection and monitoring methods as applied in Belgium on all rough diamond imports. The UK should establish a Diamond Task Force to strengthen its capacity to implement UN resolutions.
6. The Netherlands should improve its border controls in a cost-effective way, in order to avoid becoming a country through which conflict diamonds are indirectly imported. Also, the Netherlands should consider what additional border control mechanisms are needed since Schiphol Airport is being used more frequently for diamond shipments to Belgium.
7. Belgium needs to fully assess whether the absence of import licenses for diamonds imported from the Netherlands can undermine its checking mechanisms.
8. Belgium should thoroughly investigate its long-standing differences between import and exports to determine whether the higher export figures of rough diamnds are due to differences in stockpiling and valuation of diamonds, or whether the smuggling of rough diamonds is involved.
9. The international community should put pressure on UN bodies responsible for monitoring the UN resolutions to check thoroughly and regularly that no conflict diamonds receive certificates of origin from the authorities in Angola and Sierra Leone. Moreover, they should disclose the numbers of the certificates of origin being issued by the governments concerned.
10. Before a full international certification system on rough diamonds is set up, discussions and international negotiations are needed to ensure allocation of the necessary resources, so that exporting countries correctly issue certificates of origin and importing countries fully monitor and verify the certificates. An assessment of the functioning and commitment of the current system of certificates is a good basis for this discussion. A Belgian suggestion to replace certificates for some not-too-sensitive countries by (less expensive) certified invoices should be discussed.
11. A new certification system must be developed in order to examine ways to certify polished diamonds in such a way that the diamond monitoring system can make a connection with the retail customers. For they are buying diamonds and also have a responsibility in relation to stopping the trade in conflict diamonds. A first step would be to have diamonds from Sierra Leone and Angola accompanied with certificates of origin until they are polished and sold as jewels.
12. Based on Belgium’s experience with certificates from Sierra Leone and Angola, the UN members states should resolve the problems Belgium has raised, including the issue of parcels changing destination after the first importer broke the security seal, but refused to buy the parcel after seeing it at customs.

Recommendations to the EU

13. Within the EU, statistics of trade in rough diamonds among member states should be made fully comparable and include information on the countries of origin. Statistics on trade in rough diamonds among EU member states should match each other. The European Commission should build the capacity to analyse anomalies in the trade statistics of all member states, which might be related to trade, or smuggling, in conflict diamonds.
14. Given the high cost of mechanisms to monitor and inspect rough diamond imports and to verify certificates, the EU member states should discuss among themselves what resources they want to allocate individually and collectively for the implementation of a certification system for all rough diamonds. They should consider whether each EU country should operate one location for checking the import and exports of diamonds. In that way, the necessary expertise and inspection instruments can be efficiently concentrated.
15. The option suggested by Belgium that there be only one or just a few entry points for rough diamonds within the entire EU needs to be discussed. The EU country serving as an entry point would then be responsible for fully monitoring and inspecting diamond import and providing the necessary documents for exports to other EU countries.
16. The EU should define and maintain a list of ‘sensitive countries’ and adopt a Regulation to improve inspections of diamond import from these countries.
17. The European Commission should explore ways to create the necessary scope to forego EU free trade rules, which prevent necessary checks (e.g. licenses) on trade in rough diamonds among EU member states, as long as not all countries have strict diamond controls at their external borders.
18. EU member states need to urgently decide what the mandate of the Commission is in relation to discussions in international fora on conflict diamonds, as well as a new certification system. The EU policy decision-making instruments need to be streamlined. However, this exercise should not result in EU positions reflecting the lowest common denominator, but promote important efforts such as have taken place in Belgium. A co-ordinated EU position must not put the protection of commercial interests before international peace and security.
19. Within the scope of the Common Foreign and Security Policy, the EU should play a role to ensure that the UN is more explicit on how the UN resolutions need to be implemented. A deadline for when the implementation mechanisms should be in place needs to be fixed.
20. The EU should assess whether WTO rules could block measures by which stricter controls on diamonds from some particular, sensitive, countries are forbidden (i.e. no application of Most Favoured National rule). If WTO rules could block such measures, the European Commission should initiate discussions regarding this issue within the WTO.

conclusions