Diamonds, conflict prevention
and promotion of good governance
78. In the case of diamonds, the UN Security
Council has for some time imposed sanctions to prevent rebel groups
(in countries such as Angola, Sierra Leone and Liberia) from obtaining
funds from the mining and sale of rough diamonds to buy arms and
finance insurgency against legitimate governments. The Kimberley
Process Certification Scheme established in 2002 includes all
of the countries involved in the production, trade and manufacture
of diamonds and effectively works more broadly to prevent diamond
smuggling regardless of motive. Member states which do not have
acceptable certification processes may have their membership suspended.
79. Mr Alex Yearsley of the NGO Global Witness
took the view that there has been a good level of coordination
between the UK, the EU and the UN over the imposition of sanctions
on diamonds, but there were still problems with the monitoring
and enforcement of policy (Q 156). The general thrust of
Mr Yearsley's evidence was to suggest that the Kimberley
Process had been effective in denying some funds to rebel groups,
but that enforcement procedures needed to be tightened to prevent
the significant evasions that are known to occur. Asked about
the general conclusions to be drawn about the circumstances in
which commodity sanctions are likely to be successful, Mr Yearsley
pointed to the need for the source of the commodity to be readily
identifiable. On the monitoring and implementation of sanctions,
he told us:
"I would say the most general conclusion
to be drawn is that … there can be successes if it is effectively
monitored and implemented. The majority of the commodities sanctions
were never really effectively implemented or monitored, especially
with regard to the diamonds … You need to fund the enforcement
mechanisms effectively. There need to be dedicated people on this
full time. The Foreign Office have a proposal for a delegated
team within the United Nations that will permanently look at the
various sanctions regimes and the trade in conflict resources.
At the moment this is still being debated, but every time you
appoint a new expert panel, you are repeating the work …
and you waste a considerable amount of time". (Q 186)
Mr Vines also commented on this subject (Q 315).
He suggested that the Kimberley Process had contributed to a reduction
in the availability of funds for insurgent groups, but that a
point had now been reached where it was necessary to find ways
to strengthen the controls.
80. On the question of whether the Secretary-General
could divert more of the UN's budget to the effective monitoring
and enforcement of commodity sanctions, Mr Yearsley suggested
that this would be a good idea, but he did not know whether it
would be possible (Q 191). Professor Doxey suggested:
"The Interlaken and Bonn-Berlin reports,
in common with many other studies, recommend strengthening the
UN's monitoring and enforcement capabilities. In common with most
proposals for UN reform this is unlikely … The United States
is hostile to the UN; nor do other powers favour the delegation
of national responsibilities. The idea of a permanent sanctions
unit in the Secretariat has not found favour which means that
improved procedures are the most that can be hoped for and in
recent years there has been some useful progress on that front".
(p 141)
81. In relation to targeted commodity sanctions,
including diamonds, we urge the Government to continue to work
for improvements in UN monitoring and enforcement capabilities
and we support the view that a permanent UN team should be established
to assess trade in conflict commodities and the value of sanctions
in relation to them.
37 
