Why would anyone in this day and age buy a diamond from anyone and pay upfront without ensuring that the diamond was in stock and that the dealer had actually seen it. How can a reputable diamond dealer or jeweller comment on, give advice or sell a diamond they have never seen, they do not own and a diamond that is not even in the country.

This is the one singular and most important differences between Diamond Imports and all other diamond dealers, jewellers and online stores – Diamond Imports does not advertise any diamond it does not own and all the diamonds listed on the Diamond Imports website are in stock and available for immediate purchase. All customers can be assured that any diamond can be viewed in our Sydney office or be delivered as soon as payment has been made in full if purchased online. Diamond Imports does not drop ship and does not sell diamonds that are overseas. You will never see one of Diamond Imports diamonds advertised on any other website.

If the diamonds the jeweller or diamond dealer is advertising are such a good deal and quality why are they not prepared to buy the diamond for their own stock?

In the past week one diamond drop shipper, namely Diamond Exchange Ltd, has had a Notification of Application to Wind Up Company filed against it –
519G Notification of Application to Wind Up Company Under S.
Since the Application to Wind Up Company there has been an ever increasing number of complaints by customers who have purchased diamonds from this diamond drop shipper for failing to deliver the diamond they purchased and failing to refund money. The JAA – Jewellers Association of Australia has finally put a notice on their website to inform the public about this drop shipper. Read the JAA Warning.

As of today this drop shipper is still taking orders and trying to sell diamonds they do not own to unsuspecting customers. Diamond Exchange Ltd still has a string of customers waiting for refunds and the delivery of diamonds they have paid for in full and they have made no attempt to place a notice on their website under the Company Announcements Section. In light of the failings of this diamond drop shipper Diamond Imports has felt it their duty to make this news announcement to help safeguard unsuspecting consumers who are endeavouring to purchase a diamond and also to ensure any potential customer that all the diamonds listed on the website www.diamondimports.com.au are in stock and available for immediate delivery as soon as full payment has been received.

Diamond Imports prides itself on selling Superior Quality Certified Diamonds.

You may have heard of terms like Excellent Cut, Ideal Cut, Russian Make, Hearts and Arrows, Belgium Cut, Fine Make and others used by jewellers and diamond retailers when selling their diamonds in order to give the illusion of a ‘better’ quality diamond than other diamonds. Be wary of accepting these terms as is. They are especially dangerous when assigned to diamonds by the jeweler or diamond dealer themselves without third-party independent support such as a diamond certificate or diamond grading report.

It is important to remain aware of the facts and differences with certification and the process, as well as the different grading standards each diamond grading laboratory offers. While it might be possible to find certified diamonds with the same grade stated on a certificate that appears notably cheaper. As a potential diamond buyer you must be aware that there is no single set of parameters diamond laboratories grade to and every laboratory has a different set of standards. There is no such thing as cheap diamonds, if a diamond is advertised at a special price or seems to have a special price you should ask yourself why? There are no bargains in the diamond industry and there usually is a reason why one diamond is discounted or appears to be cheaper than another diamond.

Not all diamond grading laboratories are as well respected or as stringent in their grading as each other. The diamond certification laboratory or grading laboratory should be accredited, complaint and totally independent of the diamond dealer, jeweler or diamond retailer so that there is no conflict of interest or financial bias. A diamond certificate must be issued from an independent, accredited laboratory and it must accurately state the full details of the diamond if it is to be of assistance for the diamond purchaser. You should always make certain that you check the credentials of the diamond grading laboratory who issued the diamond grading report or diamond certificate. If you have not heard of the laboratory, it could very well be associated in some way with the store, jeweler or diamond wholesaler itself, and so have a vested interest in aiding the sale.

It can be a very daunting, often stressful and a long involved process when you are trying to choose the perfect diamond especially when it is for a diamond engagement ring. Just comparing diamonds on a diamond price match policy alone is not nearly good enough you have to visibly compare the diamonds next to each other to truly see which diamond is the better quality diamond.

A diamond certificate is a blueprint of a loose diamond that has been certified.

A diamond certificate can also be called a diamond grading report or diamond dossier. The diamond certificate documents the diamond’s exact measurements and weight, as well as the details of its cut and quality. It precisely points out all the individual characteristics of the stone, inclusions and any flaws.

When shopping for loose diamonds it is extremely important that you buy a certified diamond. You can compare one certified diamond with a particular weight and quality with other certified diamonds of similar weight and quality to determine which certified loose diamond has the better value.

A diamond certificate allows you to make an informed choice when buying loose diamonds.

A certified diamond provides consumers with confidence, security and increases comfort levels while making a decision on which loose diamond to purchase. Before purchasing a loose diamond, you should expect to review a copy of its diamond certificate, as this is your only guarantee of the quality and value of that diamond. Certified diamonds help provide consumer confidence.

A diamond certificate documents the characteristics of the diamonds quality; the colour, cut, clarity & carat weight of the diamond are verified by an independent company with no conflict of interest between buyer and seller.

The true test to evaluate a diamond is to view it in person and compare it with other diamonds. Nothing beats seeing a diamond in person to determine whether it is a ‘good’ diamond to your eye or not. Diamond appreciation is a very personal thing and different people will prefer different things about different diamonds. At the end of the day all the numbers and photos in the world mean nothing if you do not like the diamond in person.

Many jewellers and diamond dealers will use terms like Hearts and Arrows, Ideal, Excellent, Russian Cut, Belgium Cut, Fine Make and others to describe their diamonds, with the intention of portraying them as ‘better’ than others. Be wary of accepting these terms as is. They are especially dangerous when assigned to diamonds by the jeweller or diamond dealer themselves without third-party independent support.

There are many different diamond grading laboratories available to the diamond-buying public. Some of the more well known grading laboratories are: GIA (Gemological Institute of America), DCLA (Diamond Certification Laboratory of Australia), AGS (American Gemological Society), HRD (Hoge Raad Voor Diamant; Diamond High Council), EGL (European Gemological Institute) and the IGI (International Gemological Institute).

Each of these diamond grading laboratories has their own criteria and method of grading loose diamonds, but they all operate within a high set of parameters, in regards to grading a diamond’s attributes and dimensions. Be aware that as each grading laboratory has its own methods, each grading laboratory also has its own expense guides for preparing a certificate and these grading laboratories differ in their standards and level of strictness.

It is important to keep in mind the fact that not all diamond grading laboratories are as well respected or as stringent in their grading as each other. Diamond grading laboratories should always be independent of any diamond retailers or wholesalers, to avoid any conflict of interests or bias. Diamond Certificates are only of value when they are issued by an independent accredited diamond grading laboratory. Always make certain to identify the source of the certificate or diamond grading report. If you have not heard of the laboratory, it could very well be associated in some way with the store, jeweller or diamond wholesaler itself, and so have a vested interest in aiding the sale.

Before you buy a diamond you should always, as a first priority, insist on an independent diamond grading certificate from an accredited laboratory to support any added claims about a diamond.

A diamond is the oldest thing you will ever own, probably 3 billion years in age, fully two thirds the age of the Earth. A diamond is a strategic and high-tech supermaterial for our technological society. Diamond is the birth stone for the month of April.

A diamond is composed of the single element carbon, and it is the arrangement of the C atoms in the lattice that give a diamond its amazing properties. Both diamond and graphite are composed of just carbon. However a diamond is the hardest known material and graphite is one of the softest, this was caused by a rearrangement of the way the atoms are bonded together. Diamond carbon atoms are linked in a regular three-dimensional lattice with a repeating or crystalline pattern.

Diamond belongs to the cubic, or ‘isometric’ crystal system. The most commonly seen crystal structures or arrangements are:
• Octahedron (8 faces)
• Cube (6 faces)
• Dodecahedron (12 faces)

A diamond is the ultimate gemstone, having few weaknesses and many strengths. It is well known that diamonds are the hardest substance found in nature, but few people realize that diamonds are four times harder than the next hardest natural mineral, corundum – sapphires and rubies.

Natural diamonds are formed deep within the Earth’s mantle layer from the element carbon, about 180km below the surface, where high temperatures and pressures exist. Some diamonds form at depths of 300-400 kilometres, or even deeper, but these diamonds are particularly rare.

The earths mantel is made up of molten rock, metals and other materials. The temperature is very high at this depth – between 1100 degC and 1400 degC. The high pressures needed to form diamonds are produced by the weight of 180 km of rocks pressing down. Besides carbon, there are very small amounts of other substances, such as nitrogen and sulfur that can become trapped in the crystal when it is formed in the mantel. These impurities can give color to the diamond. One of the most rare is pink diamonds.

Natural diamonds are classified by the type and level of impurities found within them.
• Type Ia diamond – Most natural diamonds are of this type, which contain up to 0.3% nitrogen.
• Type Ib diamond – Very rare (~0.1%) in nature, but almost all synthetic (industrial) diamonds are of this type. They contain nitrogen at concentrations of up to 500 ppm.
• Type IIa diamond – Very rare in nature, these diamonds contain so little nitrogen that it can’t be easily detected by the usual IR or UV absorption measurements.
• Type IIb diamond – Extremely rare in nature. These have such a low concentration of nitrogen (even lower than type IIa) that the crystal is a p-type semiconductor (due to uncompensated B acceptor impurities).

Due to its unique internal structure and powers of light reflection, when cut to proper proportions, diamonds gather light within itself and then sends it back in a shower of fire and brilliance. The ‘life’ of a polished diamond is regarded as the amount of light that is reflected back to the viewer. The term ‘life’ is also referred to as ‘brilliance’. If the diamond is cut with good proportions then the brilliance will be increased. Lustre refers to the surface gloss on a polished diamond. Fire the play of colours that can be seen from the crown of a polished diamond. As light enters the diamond it is refracted and broken up into the colours of the spectrum and reflected back. The resulting rainbow-like colour flashes are called ‘fire’.

The hardness of diamond is an important property. As an industrial tool it has many uses and modern industry is highly dependent upon it. As a gemstone, it is resistant to scratching and abrasion, which ensures that a finished gem will retain its brilliance and polish. Because of its hardness and the unique way in which it is manufactured, a diamond polishes very slowly. It forms an unusually flat, finely-polished ‘adamantine’ surface, with very sharp, straight edges between facets. No other gemstone can quite match this standard of polish.

Diamond has the highest coefficient of thermal conductivity of any known substance because the closely-packed crystal structure conducts heat very quickly. The thermal conductivity of diamond is five times higher than that of copper. This explains why a diamond feels cold to the touch when first picked up but quickly becomes warm from the heat of your fingers.

Only about one-fifth of all mined diamonds could be considered of gem quality. From 40 to 250 tons of gravel and sand must be processed today to recover one rough diamond from the world’s thinning diamond deposits. Experts estimate that all known supplies of diamonds will be depleted within 30 to 40 years. 75 – 80% of all diamonds mined are used for industrial applications such as drilling, grinding, or sawing. The remainder are used for jewellery or investment. Less than 2% of the diamonds mined are of such high quality that they may be considered investment quality.

On average, 250 tons of ore must be mined and processed to produce a one carat diamond of gem quality. When the mining operation is completed, sorters look at rough diamonds, separating them into small piles by shape, size, and quality, a long and laborious process.

The earliest examples of diamonds in human hands were found 3,000 years ago, in India. There, diamonds were used primarily as talismans to ward off evil and protect the wearer in battle. Diamonds were also used by the early Chinese, Greeks, and Romans as an engraving tool. While there was some mystique surrounding diamonds because they were so rare and difficult to obtain–many early cultures believed they had magical properties

The word “diamond” comes from the Greek word “adamas” meaning unconquerable, in reference to the eternity of love. In 1477, Archduke Maximilian of Austria gave a diamond ring to Mary of Burgundy, thus, starting the tradition of diamond engagement rings. The reason a woman wears an engagement ring on her third finger of her left hand dates back to the Egyptian belief that the vena amoris (vein of love) ran directly from the heart to the top of that finger.

Many of the rarest diamonds occur by rare accidents of nature in shades of pink, blue, green, amber, or even red. These diamonds are referred to as “Fancy” diamonds and are evaluated by a different set of color standards. Fancy diamonds are the most expensive due to their extreme rarity.

Towards the middle of the 20th century, De Beers began using its slogan “a diamond is forever” in its advertising. Their campaign was so successful that today, diamonds are strongly associated with engagement rings–and eternal love.

It is the only gem mineral composed of a single element making it the purest of earth’s gemstones. Therefore it is fitting that the purest and most brilliant of all the world’s gemstones make the diamond engagement ring the perfect symbol of eternal love.

Diamonds, they say, are a girl’s best friend, hardly surprising when you consider the amount of work that goes into mining them, and how much these diamonds are worth on the open market. However, it has not always been a simple matter to find a diamond engagement ring in a style that you want but, it is possible to buy a loose certified diamond and then have it set in a custom designed engagement ring for that special person.

Diamond Imports are a renowned founding member of the Diamond Dealers Club of Australia and are well known for their expertise in the jewellery industry and for the quality of their diamonds. As one of Australia’s foremost dealers in diamonds the company is noted for the cut and quality of their diamonds – more importantly Diamond Imports make it their business to ensure that their clients have the knowledge to make an informed decision when choosing diamonds.

It is a simple matter to have a beautiful diamond that you want made up in a ring design of your choice because Diamond Imports sells certified loose diamonds and also have their own team of master jewelers. The company only deals in quality diamonds which are independently guaranteed and certified by compliant, internationally recognized diamond grading laboratories. In the Australian diamond business the name Diamond Imports is associated with the best quality and finest cut diamonds.

Diamond Imports will provide knowledge and education about their quality stones for customers looking to buy diamonds. They deal in loose diamonds, certified diamonds, wholesale diamonds as well as custom made diamond engagement rings, wedding rings and other jewellery.

When you have your loose diamond made into the ring of your choice by a reputable dealer such as Diamond Imports you won’t have to just settle for a ready made ring or deal with a harried shop assistant who may not always be able to tell you very much about the diamond – when you buy your diamond from Diamond Imports you can rest assured that they will provide you with all the information you require concerning your diamond as well as a stunning hand made engagement ring.

Buying a diamond that is going to be made into an engagement ring is something that, hopefully, you only do once, so you want the best quality diamond you can afford. The cut of a diamond is extremely important and it is what gives a diamond its sparkle, fire and brilliance. The most popular cuts for engagement rings are round brilliant cut and princess cut diamonds. There are other fancy shape diamonds which are unique and very beautiful, these include the pear and oval cut, asscher and cushion cuts as well as radiant, trilliant, marquise and emerald cut diamonds.

The price of the loose diamond that you buy is determined by its clarity, cut, carat weight and color as well as the shape of the stone. When you buy loose diamonds that have been independently certified you can be assured of the quality and you don’t have to depend on the pre-set designs on offer in most jewellery stores. Even those jewelers that carry loose stones have only a very limited number to choose from, which means you are restricted to the carat weight, color and cut that they have on offer. When you buy a diamond from a reputable diamond dealer like Diamond Imports you can be sure of the highest quality and a good selection of certified diamonds which you are able to compare and view before buying, which means that you always have a reliable investment and you buy diamonds with confidence.

The princess cut is the most important new cut or shape for diamonds since the invention or perfection of the modern brilliant cut over 60 years ago. The princess cut diamond is effectively a square version of the round brilliant cut, and is known technically as a square modified brilliant cut.

The princess cut was originally created by Israel Itzkowitz in 1979 at Ambar Diamonds in Los Angeles. After three years of optical research the princess cut was developed. It was a square diamond from the girdle up that had faceting similar to that of a round brilliant cut diamond from the girdle down. This accounts for the fire and brilliance seen in princess cut diamonds.

Princess cut diamonds are the most popular non-round diamond. They have a beautiful brilliance and a modern square shape that accentuates a diamond’s fire rather than its luster. Princess cut diamonds have become a favourite diamond choice for engagement rings.

The princess cut diamond is usually less expensive than a round brilliant cut diamond of the same carat weight because a diamond cutter usually does not need to shave off as much diamond weight from the rough diamond. This ability to retain more crystal weight makes this shape popular amongst diamond cutters and therefore less expensive than round brilliant cut diamonds.

The princess cut diamond is normally close to a square with a + or – 10% deviation, but it may come in more elongated versions. Try to avoid extremely thin girdles which are prone to chipping when being set. For a princess cut diamond that is square, a length to width ratio between 1:0 – 1:10 is best, if you prefer a more rectangular shape then a length to width ratio above 1:11 is best.

Diamond Imports has an exceptional range of Princess Cut Diamonds. A Princess Cut Diamond generally has 76 facets, giving it more brilliance and fire than the round brilliant. Princess cut diamonds are the most popular non-round diamond. They have a beautiful brilliance and a modern square shape that accentuates a diamond’s fire rather than its luster. Princess cut diamonds have become a favourite diamond choice for engagement rings.

When buying diamonds, make sure you buy the best quality diamond that is within your budget. Do not buy a diamond just because it has been “discounted”or the diamond dealer is offering a “special price”. These “sale” prices and deals are nothing more than marketing hype and will not result in any real savings to the price of a diamond. The price of diamonds is controlled by international market conditions and the availability. Unlike other jewellery items, diamonds do not go on sale because they do not have huge profit margins or over inflated prices.

Do not confuse a diamonds carat weight with the size of a diamond. Two diamonds that have the same carat weight could have very different diameter measurements and appearance in actual size. A poorly cut 1.00ct diamond may look like a 0.75ct diamond from the top because they have the same diameter measurements even though their carat weights are different.

Diamonds are sold by their carat weight. A diamond cutter always tries to retain as much carat weight and as few inclusions when cutting a diamond. Sometimes the cut of a diamond might be sacrificed in order to produce a diamond with a higher carat weight. Diamonds that have a higher cut quality – excellent, ideal and very good cut diamonds – will sparkle with far more brilliance and fire than poorly cut diamonds which have a lower cut grade.

The value of a diamond is determined by its exact quality as defined by the 4C’s: Cut, Colour, Clarity and Carat-Weight. It is the sparkle or brilliance that gives a diamond its unique quality. Many people become overwhelmed when they start searching for a diamond. It seems that the fear of either buying a diamond that is not very good quality or paying too much can cause people to go on a quest to become a diamond expert overnight. Getting knowledge and educated about diamonds and the 4C’s – Cut, Colour, Clarity & Carat Weight – is a big first step towards buying the right diamond.

Before you start diamond shopping, it is best to have an understanding of what you are buying and the process behind buying a diamond. Today on the internet there is no shortage of information available, especially when it comes to learning about diamonds. Here are a few important steps when embarking on the purchase of a diamond -

Gain a basic understanding of the qualities of a fine diamond.

Learn about diamonds, do your homework before you start looking. There are many good websites that offer comprehensive Diamond Education sections where you are able to learn about diamonds and The 4C’s – cut, colour, clarity and carat weight. These are the criteria that diamonds are graded and valued upon.

Set a personal budget.

This will dictate a lot of the parameters for the diamond you are searching for. Then obtain a realistic idea of what diamonds cost and the various diamond prices. Round Brilliant Cut Diamonds are the most popular shape of diamond for engagement rings however they also are higher priced than a fancy shape diamond. Setting a personal budget will save you a lot of time and it will help you to not over extend yourself financially.

Decide on the diamond specifications.

What shape of Diamond do you prefer? Remember that diamonds are cut in many different shapes besides Round Brilliant and Princess Cuts. Fancy Shape diamonds such as Asscher, Cushion, Emerald, Oval, Pear, Marquise, Trilliant and Radiant Cut Diamonds all make unique engagement rings and create beautiful jewellery when set in individual designs. Once you have decided on the shape of the diamond you wish to buy then start deciding on your other preferences such as the carat size, the diamond colour, the diamond purity and the diamond cut quality.

Insist on a Diamond Certificate.

A diamond certificate or diamond grading report documents the complete quality and description of the diamond, it includes information on shape, carat weight, clarity, fluorescence, colour grade, measurements, proportions and finish grade. A diamond certificate also confirms that the diamond is natural and is not synthetic or man-made. Diamond Grading Laboratories such as GIA, AGS, HRD & DCLA are all internationally recognized and compliant grading laboratories.

View the diamond in person where possible.

Compare the quality of the diamond next to other diamonds before you purchase. Cut is the only factor that man can control. Cut refers not only to the shape and style of the diamond, but its proportions, symmetry, and finish or “make”. Cut determines the brilliance and fire of the diamond and is actually one of the most important aspects to consider when choosing your diamond.

We understand that when searching for the right diamond the task can at times be daunting and very confusing. Just comparing diamonds on price alone is not nearly good enough, you need to be able to compare the diamonds next to each other to see which diamond is the better quality and appeals to you the most.

Diamonds are cut in a range of shapes, sizes and qualities all of which influence the price. Diamonds that have an excellent or very good cut grade will reflect maximum fire, brilliance and sparkle and the price of these diamonds will be higher than diamonds with a good cut grade.

The Shape of Diamonds

Round Brilliant Cut Diamonds are the most popular diamonds for diamond engagement rings followed by Princess Cut Diamonds. Any diamond that is not Round in shape is known as a Fancy Shape Diamond. Asscher, Cushion, Emerald, Heart, Marquise, Oval, Pear, Princess, Radiant and Trilliant cut diamonds are all fancy shape diamonds.

Round Brilliant Cut Diamonds are the most expensive mainly because when cutting a Round Brilliant Cut diamond there is a greater loss in rough which has to be factored into the price. Another reason why Round Brilliant Cut diamonds are priced higher is because they take longer to polish and cut than other diamond shapes and the demand for Round Brilliant Cut diamonds is greater than all the other diamond shapes.

Clarity Influences Diamond Prices The Most

The clarity grade of a diamond influences the price obtained more than any of the other factors. Diamonds that have high clarity grades of VVS1 or VVS2 have extremely hard to find inclusions even with a jewellers 10x loupe. These diamonds are almost pure and rarer to find than diamonds with lower clarity grades such as SI1 or SI2 and therefore command a much higher price. The rarest of diamonds have an Internally Flawless Diamonds -IF or Loupe Clean clarity grade and these diamonds fetch premium prices.

Colour Influences Diamond Prices

Colour is another important factor that influences the price of a diamond. Diamonds are graded for their colour alphabetically starting at D colour going down to Z colour. Diamonds that are colourless or show the least amount of colour obtain the highest prices along with fancy coloured diamonds such as pink, red, green and blue diamonds. Diamonds that display the least amount of colour are known as exceptional white. Exceptional white diamonds includes D and E colour graded diamonds. Rare white is the next colour grade and this includes F and G colour diamonds. H colour diamonds are graded as white and I and J colour diamonds are known as slightly tinted white diamonds.

Cut Influences Sparkle, Shine & The Price of Diamonds

Did you know that if the diamond is poorly cut, the colour and clarity can not make up for it? The cut of a diamond is what makes a rough diamond sparkle and shine. If a diamond is poorly cut, the light that enters the diamond from above will leak out of the sides and bottom of the stone, and the diamond will not have the optimum amount of sparkle or fire—regardless of its colour or clarity.

Excellent and Ideal Cut Diamonds have been cut to precise standards to display the beauty of the diamond. Excellent and Ideal Cut Diamonds have perfection in proportion, symmetry and polish and they will always display the maximum brilliance, fire & scintillation.

Excellent and Ideal Cut Diamonds have properly proportioned facets, excellent symmetry & polish. Since 97.5% of a diamond’s brilliance is controlled by the quality of the cut Excellent and Ideal cut diamonds obtain higher prices. The Diamond Cut Grade is made up of three main controlling factors – Proportion, Symmetry and Polish. The light return of the diamond more commonly known as sparkle or brilliance is also an important factor but it is governed by the proportions and symmetry of the diamond cut.

Diamonds with a Very Good cut grade reflect most of the light that enters them, dispersing a good deal of brilliance. Very Good cut diamonds have proportions which often overlap and are comparable to Excellent cut diamonds but just differ slightly in one area or measurement. Very Good cut diamonds are also highly valued.

Diamonds are Sold By Carat Weight

Carat is a unit of measure not size. Two diamonds that have the same carat weight may appear to be different sizes depending on how the diamond is cut. Some diamonds will have extra weight on the bottom part of the diamond, the pavilion, or a thick girdle and therefore will appear smaller visually.

Diamonds are sold by their carat weight. The heavier a diamond weighs once it is cut the higher the price per carat. A diamond cutter always try to retain as much carat weight and as few inclusions when cutting a diamond in order to obtain the best possible price per carat. Sometimes the cut of a diamond might be sacrificed in order to produce a diamond with a higher carat weight. Hundreds of tons of rock and ore must be processed to uncover a single one-carat gem quality diamond.

4C’s – Cut, Colour, Clarity & Carat

After diamonds have been sorted into their different shapes they are then assessed with what is known as The 4C’s- The Cut, Colour, Clarity and Carat weight. These individual factors are all combined resulting in the price of the diamond. The price of diamonds is also influenced by international market conditions such as exchange rates, supply and demand, fashion trends as well as inflation.

Diamonds, just like your marriage, are an investment, and have been an investment device for several thousand years. Diamonds are a symbol of love and commitment so buying the perfect diamond for an engagement ring or that special occasion is a crucially important decision.

Diamond Imports is one of Australia’s largest importers of loose diamonds specialising in Excellent Cut and Ideal Cut diamonds, Certified diamonds and fancy shape diamonds – www.diamondimports.com.au

Guys who are ready to ask for a woman’s hand in marriage will inevitably attempt to figure out how much money they should spend on a diamond engagement ring, what the diamond will cost them and whether they will be able to afford a diamond engagement ring for their fiance. Most people have heard the expression that diamond engagement rings cost two months’ salary.

Where did the two months of salary idea come from?

The origin of the two months’ salary began with DeBeers, the largest diamond producer and diamond marketer in the world. In 1947, DeBeers decided to promote diamonds following the depressed wartime market. DeBeers launched a marketing campaign with a New York advertising firm. A copywriter penned the famous slogan “A diamond is forever” that is now synonymous with Diamonds.

De Beers wanted to bring diamonds to the masses, make them seem more affordable, rather than have them just for sold to the wealthy and select few. Accordingly, the price of a diamond for an engagement ring was set at approximately two months of salary.

This was a concept that everyone could understand, it was aimed at the groom-to-be and therefore made buying a diamond for an engagement ring achievable no matter whatever his salary was. No longer did people think of diamonds as being something which they could never afford, they now had a figure to relate to in simple terms – two months salary.

The two months salary became the norm and in the mind of the groom it was the predetermined acceptable price for a diamond engagement ring. As a general guide usually grooms spend bewteen 10 – 20% of their annual salary on a diamond engagement ring.

At Diamond Imports – www.diamondimports.com.au – we have an exceptional range of certified loose diamonds that create stunning diamond engagement rings.

ICD member jewellers pledge to accurately and proactively disclose all details of diamond and jewellery characteristics. Implications of non-disclosure constitute deception, and as such will be investigated and appropriate action pursued.

ICD member jewellers pledge to always provide independently certified diamonds from an internationally recognised laboratory.

ICD member jewellers pledge to uphold the highest degree of individual integrity, honesty, and business ethics. The members must possess a reputation for unquestioned honour, and must conduct themself in a way that will enhance the confidence of the public in diamonds and the jewellery industry.

ICD member jewellers pledge to offer merchandise and service of the highest quality appropriate with price.

ICD member jewellers pledge to establish clearly the guarantee or service policy regarding all jewellery, and fulfil that policy.

ICD member jewellers pledge to supply educated, experienced, and highly qualified service in the subject of diamonds and jewellery, and clearly indicate the true quality of products offered for sale.

ICD member jewellers pledge to uphold the objectives of the Kimberly Process and by no means trade in conflict diamonds

ICD Trustmark

The Trustmark is a definitive image that identifies extraordinary diamond jewellers subscribing to the high standards, transparent trade and pristine ethics required to bear the ICD icon.

The Trustmark symbolises the sparkle and flash of a diamond, using the passionate shades of pink to reflect the emotions that so often accompany a purchase. The circle of five ‘ticks’ represent the principal 5 C’s of a diamond: Cut, Colour, Clarity, Carats, and the most important C of all, Confidence.

Where you see this Trustmark you can be confident that, not only will the jeweller will be providing you with an independently certified diamond, examined and graded by a qualified and recognised laboratory, but will also instil you with confidence that you are truly buying the treasure you’ve been searching for.

Look for the Trustmark

Buy Independently Certified Diamonds

Laboratory Accreditation Bureau (LAB), the firm that performs certification assessment, provides third party attestation of technical confidence. “Laboratory tests are supposed to be repeatable and verifiable—we should all be doing it the same way,” explains Jason Stine, Testing Program Manager for LAB. Currently, GCAL is the only diamond grading lab in North America to earn this prestigious certification, and it is one of only three diamond grading labs in the world that is ISO 17025:2005 accredited.

This coveted certification stands for reassurance and minimal risk. An accredited lab offers several distinctions for its customers including accurate grading the first time/less retesting, enhancing consumer confidence, and making goods more easily accepted overseas. Because ISO is internationally recognized, exporters don’t have to retest for most other markets: Over 40 laboratory accreditation bodies have signed a multilateral recognition statement called the ILAC Arrangement, which greatly enhances the acceptance of data across the borders of member countries.

GCAL will continue to be tested periodically to ensure compliance with all regulations and standards. According to Donald A. Palmieri, president of GCAL, ISO accreditation is a tremendous milestone in the company’s growth and expansion. “We are very proud to be the first lab in this country to conform to ISO laboratory standards, and we see it as a testament to offering the most reliable and accurate grading in the industry. Our customers expect more from GCAL, and we want to live up to that expectation regardless of the time, effort or cost it takes to be the best.”

What: An Unmounted, Cushion-Cut Diamond

Type of Diamonds

Natural diamonds are classified by the type and quantity of impurities found within them.

Type Ia – This is the most common type of natural diamond, containing up to 0.3% nitrogen.Clustered nitrogen atoms. Colourless to Yellow. 98% of all diamonds are Type Ia.

Type Ib – Very few natural diamonds are this type (~0.1%), but nearly all synthetic industrial diamonds are. Type Ib diamonds contain up to 500 ppm nitrogen. These diamonds about 0.1% prevalent.Isolated Nitrogen Atoms. Orange, Orange Yellow to Brown.Depending on the precise concentration and spread of the nitrogen atoms, these diamonds can appear deep yellow (“canary”), orange, brown or greenish.

Type IIa – This type is very rare in nature. Type IIa diamonds contain so little nitrogen that it isn’t readily detected using infrared or ultraviolet absorption methods. No specific colour centre.Yellow, Brown , Pink and Purple Type IIa diamonds have been documented. These diamonds are 1% to 2% prevalent.These diamonds can be considered as the “purest of the pure” – they contain no, or minuscule amounts of impurities, are usually colourless, highly transparent and can be a higher colour grade than D.Diamond Imports recently sold a round brilliant 1.36 carat D IF Ex/ Ex Type IIa.

Type IIb – This type is the rarest in nature. Type IIb diamonds contain no measurable amounts of nitrogen (even lower than type IIa) that the crystal is a p-type semiconductor.These diamonds contain no nitrogen – but they contain boron, which absorbs red, orange and yellow light. These diamonds therefore usually appear to be blue, although they can also be grey or nearly colorless. All naturally blue diamonds belong to Type IIb, which makes up 0.1% of all diamonds.

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Diamond Imports

Cushion Cut Diamonds

A packed luncheon debut of a jewelry exhibit took place this week at The Forbes Galleries in New York.

Fashion journalists and jewelry artists alike crowded the 2008 Designer Showcase, a product of the six-year-old nonprofit National Jewelry Institute.

The group aims “to preserve, research, and exhibit fine jewelry from all over the world,” according to its mission statement, and already has held jewelry exhibitions in London, Paris, and New York.

Previous shows have singled out specific designers and periods of craft, but this latest display thrusts an international range of contemporary designers—from brands to studio jewelers—into a well-deserved spotlight.

New York–based Tanya Farah was invited to participate by NJI and sponsor World Gold Council (AXA Art serves as a second benefactor), as well as Paris’s Lorenz Bäumer and Fabio Salini of Rome. A total of 40 jewelry designers are participating in the show, which highlights selections of artists’ current work in an effort to exemplify their unique tools, materials, and ideas.

The event opens to the public today, is free (yes, that’s $0), and runs until June 28.
At that time, all the treasures, which are on loan from respective designers, relocate to Pittsburgh for a six-month stint, starting July 19, at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History.

Vhernier Bridge Bracelets Rose Gold

Turquoise, Diamonds

Ultimately, NJI president Judith Price hopes the venue will create more interest in jewelry, more often—as in increased sales. “Jewelry is a fashion purchase,” she says.For more information, log onto www.forbesgalleries.com.
Source: JCK Style

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Diamond Imports

Diamond Engagement Ring Designs

Rosh Pinna, translation Cornerstone, once a place you passed through on the bus has become very trendy with small coffee shops and dress shops opening up on the sides of once dusty forgotten streets and lane ways. It’s a pretty place compared to thirty years ago when I used to live in the area. It amused me because the name Rosh Pinna rhymed with the Czech words ” motz shpina ” translation big mess.

And what a big mess it is too. Studying Kabbalah without studying Chumash, the foundation, is tantamount to building a house with the roof first.

Anyway it’s business as usual… don’t forget to buy your genuine Madonna ” kabbalah crosses ” hanging on some cheap red thread. It might make you feel good and only make you look confused to those of us who know better.

Hooooroooo from De Guru

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Diamond Imports

Diamonds of Excellence

HONG KONG (Xinhua): The largest colorless diamond seen at auction in nearly 20 years will go under the hammer on May 28 in Christie’s Hong Kong sale, officials said as it was previewed here Tuesday.

“Only three colorless diamonds of over 100 carats have ever appeared at auction, all sold in Geneva,” said Francois Curiel, chairman of jewelry at Christie’s.

The Spring sale of magnificent jewels on May 28 will sell 345 lots estimated to achieve in excess of $ 56 million.

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Diamond is cool—even at room temperature. The stiff crystalline structure that makes diamond nature’s hardest material can shield an atom from heat vibrations—not forever, but a lot longer than in other materials.

Physicists have now learned to use that ultimate cocoon quality to store and manipulate information in single atoms at room temperature—feats that in other materials require getting to the neighborhood of absolute zero. Because its atoms can store the notoriously peculiar quantum information, diamond has become a candidate material for use in future quantum computers. Such devices would rely on quantum weirdness to perform certain tasks that would take an ordinary computer till the end of time.

Read more here

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Nano sized diamond crystals (Credit: University of Melbourne)

University of Melbourne scientists have managed to create nanometer-sized diamonds, by shooting carbon atoms into glass and the heating the glass. The diamonds’ properties may help in creating quantum computers capable of performing parallel computing tasks that cannot be carried out by conventional computers.

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Diamond Imports

Highest Quality Certified Diamonds

AWDC (Antwerp World Diamond Center) and Belgian Post – (De Post-La Poste) have announced the release of Antverpia 2010 postage stamps, a part of the philatelistic program of the Belgian Post.

These stamps announce a European championship and an exhibition of stamps, named Antverpia 2010.

It shows Antwerp as an active town: the transport, the history, the harbour, the fashion and of course the diamonds.

With only a handful of postage stamps in the world featuring diamonds, and even rarer featuring a diamond jewellery piece; this postage stamp is a rare honour for a diamond jewellery piece and a jewellery artist’s work.

The diamond necklace featured on the postage stamp uses 101.0 carats of diamonds.

The neckpiece was designed by Reena Ahluwalia in collaboration with Diarough N.V, Belgium (diamond sponsor) and Shrenuj & Co. Ltd. (jewel sponsor).

The piece was a finalist in the HRD Awards 2007 design competition, organized by the Antwerp World Diamond Centre.

The theme for the competition was “A Night at the Opera” and the design pays homage to the legendary diva Maria Callas.

Speaking on the occasion of this release, Reena Ahluwalia said: “I am deeply honoured as this represents the highest recognition one can get as a diamond jewellery artist. “

” This is beyond any aspiration, one does not work thinking that one day your work will be on a postage stamp. It is overwhelming for me, as this small piece of paper represents a microcosm of sorts of the diamond industry. “

More than 50% of the world’s production of rough, polished and industrial diamond passes through Antwerp. 8 in 10 of all rough diamonds in the world are handled in Antwerp and 1 in 2 of all cut diamonds passes through Antwerp.

With Antwerp diamond sector having an annual turnover of 39 billion U.S dollars, the diamond trade is responsible for 8% of Belgian exports, and 12% of the Flemish region’s exports. 30,000 people are directly or indirectly employed by the Belgian diamond sector. Source

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Belgium : The Ugly Forgotten Truth

Additional Reading on Past Belgian Atrocities & More:

The Crime of the Congo By Arthur Conan Doyle Historical

King Leopold II of Belgium Killer File Historical

Belgium’s Imperialist Rape of Africa Historical

ILLICIT DIAMONDS FLOW Current: Antwerp during the Blood Diamond (Conflict Diamond) era and still today is the major world rough diamond recipient headquarters.

The Belgians have done a wonderful job of sanitizing their international public profile and reputation in the past and now but they never compensated for the atrocities over the last one hundred and fifty years benefiting from African natural resources far removed from the tragedies they were the cause of.

Lest we forget,

De Guru.

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Diamond Imports

Diamond Jewellery Designers

A few minutes after 6, when the auction had been set to start, the cellphone of François Curiel, the director of Christie’s jewelry department, rang. He listened, said thank you and hung up.
“There is no auction tonight,” he announced to a small group of international jewelry dealers gathered at Christie’s Rockefeller Center rooms.

ALSO caught up in the drama is Peter E. Bacanovic, the former Merrill Lynch broker who was sentenced to five months in prison for his role in the Martha Stewart stock case. In January, the month Merrill Lynch first filed suit against Mr. Esmerian in State Supreme Court in Manhattan, he hired Mr. Bacanovic as president of Fred Leighton. He assigned him, among other duties, the job of using his strong social connections to help open a Beverly Hills store.

Hundreds of discerning jewel lovers had descended on Christie’s to admire the glittering wares of Mr. Esmerian. But he was conspicuously absent.

Mr. Esmerian had used the jewelry as part of his collateral for $177 million in loans (now $187 million, with interest and costs) from Merrill Lynch, most of which went to finance the purchase of Fred Leighton. Mr. Esmerian’s contention — part of his legal maneuvers last week — was that his jewelry collection had been undervalued for the forced sale.

Mr. Esmerian was apoplectic about the planned auction being forced by Merrill Lynch. In an emotional interview on Tuesday, he shook his head in dismay as he thumbed through Christie’s lavishly illustrated catalog, pointing to beloved items of jewelry collected by him and by his late father, Raphael Esmerian, a gem dealer who emigrated from Paris in 1940.

How did Mr. Esmerian — an aesthete educated at Groton and Princeton who until last year controlled a jewelry collection estimated to be worth hundreds of millions of dollars — land in such a predicament? His lawyer Helen Davis Chaitman ascribed his woes to a clash of cultures between her client, an amiable philanthropist who has given millions to museums, she said, and Merrill Lynch bankers who issued and capriciously rescinded his credit.

Among other philanthropic work, Mr. Esmerian is chairman emeritus of the American Folk Art Museum, to which he pledged 400 works in 2000.

With the bank’s encouragement, Mr. Esmerian borrowed $110 million more in March 2006, in part to buy Fred Leighton, an estate jewelry company with stores on Madison Avenue and at the Bellagio in Las Vegas, which had raised the profile of estate jewelry in the United States.

IN acquiring Fred Leighton, Mr. Esmerian planned to sell museum-quality jewels from the family’s Special Collection in a retail setting, along with thousands of other pieces from his private stock. (Until then his business was mostly wholesale, consigning jewels to Cartier and other luxury stores around the world.)

After he made timely payments for more than a year, Mr. Esmerian said, the merriment expired abruptly in September 2007 when he called his bankers at Merrill Lynch to ask for two weeks’ leeway for half his monthly interest payments of $1.5 million. “They said, ‘Sorry, we can’t give you any more time to pay the interest,’ ” he said.

Ms. Chaitman places the blame for Merrill’s decision to force the sale of Mr. Esmerian’s jewels on the bank’s own internal woes related to the subprime mortgage crisis. The bank has taken some $30 billion in mortgage-related write-downs since last year; on Thursday it announced layoffs of 2,900 employees.

“In December we had reached agreement on negotiated terms for a forbearance that would have avoided court,” Mr. Halldin said, “but he refused to sign the documentation needed.”

(Ms. Chaitman responded that her client had been forthcoming with Merrill Lynch about his jewelry holdings and that money from some jewelry sales did not go into proper accounts because of a mistake by another bank.)

ANOTHER concern of Merrill’s, Mr. Halldin said, was Mr. Esmerian’s hiring of Mr. Bacanovic, a former stockbroker with a criminal record. The bank discussed its misgivings with Mr. Esmerian.

Fired from his job at Merrill and banned from the securities industry, Mr. Bacanovic had been struggling to find a new path after his release from prison in Las Vegas. “Unlike Martha Stewart, who came right out of jail and went back to running her company,” Ms. Chaitman said, “Peter did not have a platform to come back to.”

While Mr. Bacanovic is not a party to the litigation between Merrill Lynch and Mr. Esmerian, he is involved in pushing Fred Leighton forward, despite the continuing drama. He has changed the displays in the New York store, hired sales people, worked with a public relations team to publicize the brand and brought in his friends, Ms. Chaitman said.

“He has an enormous group of friends and supporters,” Ms. Chaitman said. “And he mixes in a circle of people who can become Fred Leighton customers.”

But in a surprise move, Mr. Esmerian’s lawyers filed for bankruptcy protection of his companies at 4:20. The sale was off again. “In my 40 years at Christie’s, this is the first time it happens,” Mr. Curiel, the auctioneer, said after he had announced the halt, calming his nerves with a white wine spritzer at the bar.

Merrill now seems to have given up on selling the jewelry. Both sides have taken a breath and seem resigned to working within the confines of bankruptcy court. “We think it’s positive that there will be close court supervision of all their activities,” Mr. Halldin said. In any case, the jewelry auction season has passed in New York, and the next one is not until December.

It seems that neither diamonds nor fine art are truly forever. Some of the paintings Mr. Esmerian gave to the American Folk Art Museum were outright gifts, and some were merely promised as gifts, with the understanding that they were being used as collateral on a loan from Sotheby’s.

Although a promise is only a promise, the museum was taken by surprise. “We didn’t know about Ralph’s problems,” said Susan Flamm, a spokeswoman.

From top; Evan Agostini/Getty Images; Hiroko Masuike for The New York Times; Lars Klove for The New York Times
BEDAZZLING Ralph O. Esmerian, center, encouraged actresses like Cameron Diaz, top, to wear his jewelry and hired Peter E. Bacanovic, above, as president of his estate jewelry concern, Fred Leighton. Now Mr. Esmerian is at the center of a battle over a big part of his collection.
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Diamond Imports

Diamonds of Excellence

” According to a recent DeBeers study, four out of five brides receive diamond engagement rings.

National Jeweler’s 2003 survey found that more than 40 percent of customers planned on buying a diamond one carat or larger.

And the 2002 American Wedding Study (sponsored by Condé Nast) revealed that the average engagement ring costs $3,576: more than 16 percent of the average wedding budget. “ Source

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I found this interesting when comparing America versus Australia.

If more than 40% of Americans are spending an average of USD$3576 approx AUD$4000 GST inclusive and plan on buying a diamond one carat or larger this indicates to me that Australians in general have a much higher standard.

A one carat diamond in any shape for USD$3576 we avoid stocking.

It would be a low quality diamond. A chain store special, colour L to P and Si2 to P2.

Factor in the cost of the ring and you would be buying a below average one carat product. For USD$3576 you could however acquire a high quality 0.40 to 0.60 ct diamond.

Remember round brilliant diamonds tend to be 15% to 20 % higher in price than a similar weight non round fancy shape. In fact you simply get more diamond for your money in a fancy shape which lends to a more unique enagement ring.

Fortunately we have clients who have spent time on researching prior to purchase and wish to spend more. It is difficult for us to ascertain an average price because we have so many different types of clients but between AUD$7000 to AUD$20,000 is not unusual.

This does not mean those who purchase between AUD$3000 to AUD$6,000 are sacrificing quality. You can still purchase high quality diamonds at these prices just not one carat diamonds.

Hooooroooo from De Guru

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Diamond Imports

Diamond Engagement Rings

Ivana Trump has snagged a man twenty years her junior, and has married him this past weekend.

For the wedding dinner reception Saturday evening, which was attended by more than 300 friends, Ivana wore a Leviev diamond bracelet, earrings and necklace totaling more than 150 carats.

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Diamond Imports

Diamonds of Excellence

In 2005, AGS Labs released its Performance-Based Cut Grading System for both the round brilliant and the princess – the first cut grading system for a fancy shaped diamond. Soon after, the lab also released a cut grade for the emerald shaped diamonds.

AGS noted that it is continuing its research into cut grade for fancy shapes, and more shapes are expected to come on-line soon.

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Diamond Imports

Oval Shape Diamonds

“ I never do anything with my hands ” and other myths of the jewelry repair game.
by Richard W. Wise, G.G.
©2008

If one more client comes in and tells me her ring should not need repair because “I never do anything with my hands”, I think I am going to spit-up.

You know, just after you mention a price to do the repair she bristles like a porcupine then exclaims: “I don’t understand it! Why did it break? I always take the ring off before I do dishes.”

The suppressed premise here is that jewelry is or should be indestructible. Apparently at least 20% of the American public believes this to be true. Jewelry should not break and if it does it must be defective and therefore the fault of the jeweler.

I guess I just don’t get it! If you buy a new car, drive it off the lot and run into a light pole, the dealer is going to charge you to remove the dent. Most expensive items we buy come with a 90 day to 1 year limited warranty. Yet some consumers seem to expect that a piece of jewelry should come with an all risk warranty. Name me another consumer item that comes with the expectation of free maintenance for life?

I have had clients approach me as much as a decade after a piece was made. Case in point; Mrs. D, an active sportswoman (tennis, skiing, golf) in her middle years: we had made her a handmade 18k yellow gold solitaire engagement ring with a 5 carat blue sapphire sitting right on top of it. The ring had been worn all day, every day for a dozen years and the prongs were quite worn and the setting required a rebuild. The client didn’t understand. How could this be? Why should she pay to have the work done? After all, we had made the ring. Only after a half hour of explanation did she calm down and agree to have the work done and pay for it.

Jewelry, like all material things, is subject to wear and tear and requires occasional maintenance.

Gold is a beautiful material but it is soft. Platinum is more durable but it too will wear over time.

The fact is that in our post-industrial world almost anything, doorknobs, washing machines, butter knives, golf clubs, can scratch, dent or otherwise damage precious materials. Gemstones, even diamond, the hardest substance on earth, can be chipped and broken.

Diamonds or how you can break the hardest substance on earth:
I recall selling a high quality carat size princess cut diamond to a client. Six months later she returned. The diamond was broken in half and she was very upset; in her mind the diamond must have been defective. “I hit it hard but I didn’t think it could break.” I tried to explain the difference between hardness and toughness and pointed out that even diamond can break.

The client looked at me like I had three heads. Many people, even jewelers, don’t understand the difference between hardness and toughness.

Hardness is simply a measure of scratch-ability. Diamond, the hardest substance, is 10 on the Mohs hardness scale meaning that it cannot be scratched by any other substance but it can still break. Ruby/Sapphire, is rated 9 and is the second hardest substance; it will not scratch a diamond but it is tougher and more resistant to breakage. A crisis was averted when the client’s insurance company replaced the diamond with barely a murmur.

Some jewelry items are damaged more easily than others. Rings are number one followed by bracelets, earrings and pendants.

Fine handmade pieces may be more susceptible to certain kinds of damage due to the fact that they are joined together with solder rather than being cast in one piece. After all, a Maserati requires more tune-ups than a Ford.

Conversely, some handmade pieces are actually tougher due to hand forging and temper. One piece castings can cause real problems. Remember that bargain priced ruby ring that you bought in India? Remember how it began losing stones, like rain falling from the sky, as soon as you cleared customs?

Buying Antique Jewelry, the Inheritance can be taxing:
When purchasing antique or vintage jewelry bear in mind that this is a piece of jewelry that has been around for awhile. Antique jewelry is normally sold as is! You are buying a piece of history which means you are inheriting any and all problems that come with it. You can hardly expect the dealer to be responsible for re-doing a wonky repair that comes apart 50 years later.

Choose the right materials for the job:
Today we have a lot of choices and some precious materials are more durable than others. Pure gold is 2.5-3.0 on Moh’s scale of hardness, platinum is 4-4.5.0. So if you want that wedding ring to last for fifty years, platinum is your best choice.

Common dust is composed mainly of quartz which rates 7.0 on the scale. Leaving aside toughness, gemstones below this level of hardness are a poor choice for everyday wear because simple cleaning will cause minute scratching that will gradually become visible. Think about that opal that just seems to stay foggy no matter how often you rub it.

The Victorian age ended a century ago. Most of us do not wear white gloves or attend afternoon tea parties and we cannot afford a footman to open our doors or a maid to do our dishes and we use our hands all day, every day.

We wear our jewelry and yes that jewelry is subject to wear and tear and may perhaps lose a stone or even break.

If you are looking for an all risk warranty against all the vicissitudes of modern life don’t look to your jeweler, I suggest you contact your spiritual advisor or perhaps, more to the point, your insurance agent.

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Diamond Imports

Diamond Rings

Mattel’s popular childhood icon, Barbie, is the inspiration of a new jewelry collection scheduled to be launched this month. The first collection, which features pink diamonds, precious and semi-precious colored stones and rare metals, entitled Silhouette, portrays the classic Barbie profile of a ponytail, long eyelashes and a ski-jump nose.

The collection includes two necklaces: the “Luxe” Barbie pendant and Barbie dogtag in 18k white, yellow or rose gold with black diamonds or yellow or pink sapphires; and, the “Classic” necklace in sterling silver.

The collection also contains Barbie bracelets in sterling silver with 18k rose gold charms.

The first collection is the Silhouette collection that shows the classic ponytail, long eyelashes and ski-jump nose profile. It features two necklace styles: the “Luxe” Barbie™ Pendant and Barbie™ DogTag, in 18K white, yellow or rose gold, with white or black diamonds or yellow or pink sapphires; and the “Classic,” which is done in sterling silver.

The Barbie bracelets are available in sterling silver with 18K rose gold charms

The jewelry, which was created by Layna and Alan Friedman, can be purchased at the Alan Friedman boutique or online for amounts which range between US$185 to US$15,000.

A portion of the proceeds from sales will be donated to the Children Affected by Aids Foundation.

Source: Luxist

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Diamond Imports

Highest Quality Certified Diamonds

Inspired by a sensual and exquisitely feminine couture style, Piaget dares to go for a “sexy “look with creations echoing the lacing on corsets that are tied and untied with voluptuous delight. In an ultra-chic interpretation of wild Parisian nights, a ruby and pink sapphire necklace imitates untied ribbons hanging nonchalantly along a plunging neckline.

In the same glamorous spirit, Piaget introduces a fabulous cuff watch, a recurrent and emblematic object in the brand’s history.

Entirely paved with diamonds, this watch literally wraps the wrist in light, evoking a luxurious corset delicately laced by a ribbon of square-cut diamonds, and also comes in a version with a colourful satin ribbon.

SPECIFICATIONS: 18-carat white gold cuff-watch with case, dial and bracelet paved with 1576 brilliant-cut diamonds (85.8 cts) and 83 baguette-cut diamonds (7.4 cts) Piaget 56P quartz movement

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Diamond Imports

Finest Quality Diamonds

Loose Diamonds

Historical Feature: Sierra Leone Diamond Sector Financial Policy Constraints

June 2003 Above Link

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The Lure of Sierra Leone Diamonds

By Elizabeth Blunt BBC News, Sierra Leone

Diamonds continue to be big business for Sierra Leone and through the years many have been tempted to join the hunt in the hope of a lucky find.

Diamond diggers may well be like fishermen – the biggest one is always the one that got away.

But in Kenema, Sierra Leone’s main diamond town, whole streets are lined with diamond buyers’ shops, and there are enough stones flowing in to make them all a living.

If you own or can rent land along the streams where the stones are washed down out of the diamond-bearing rock, then you have a very decent chance of striking it lucky.

Hangha village, just north of Kenema, was one of the first places diamonds were found.

It was to Hangha that Queen Elizabeth was taken in 1961 to see the diggers at work.

It was the people of Hangha who appeared on the old one Leone note, sifting gravel in a rectangular pit.

And it was in Hangha that I met a man who told me the quintessential diamond story.

Addictive
In the days when the industry was just starting up, Patrick Sandy was a young teacher, earning the modest salary of £10 ($19.50) a month.

He and his brothers thought they would try looking for diamonds on the family farm.And they rapidly made some very good finds.

Patrick told me that his best stone was the size of a large pea, and it sold for £11,000.

There was no contest, he gave up teaching and went into the diamond business.

Arguing that if they could find diamonds with so little effort, then digging on a larger scale would bring enormous wealth. He bought tools, hired labourers and set them to work clearing the land, digging, washing and sifting the gravel.

But there was nothing.

He never made another significant find, despite searching until all his money was gone.
Diamond digging is like gambling – it’s very addictive.

The winner goes back to the tables, convinced that he is on a roll and that even greater success will follow.

The loser carries on grimly, determined to keep going until he has recouped his losses.

The few who do make money are the ones who have the strength of mind to quit while they are ahead.

Small Scale
Hangha, which is built on top of a diamond field, is a dusty, forlorn place. There are men hanging around in the shade, a video parlour showing Nigerian-made movies, and a pavement vendor selling a small selection of shovels, pickaxe heads and sieves.

On the outskirts of the town are burnt and broken houses.

These diamond areas were endlessly fought over and suffered badly during Sierra Leone’s civil war.

And yet diamonds should not have to be a curse.

Alongside some big companies, mining diamonds directly from the rock, Sierra Leone has a quite liberal and well-structured system, which allows ordinary people in the diamond areas to try their hand at alluvial mining on a small scale.

If they buy a licence they can keep what they find, and sell it through licensed buyers.

If they do not have suitable land or the means to support themselves while they dig, they can find themselves a so-called “supporter” who will sponsor them while they do it.And for a young, single man at least, it is not too bad a deal.

Windfalls
We talked to a group who were digging out a river bed near the village.

It was hard, hot work, but they were happy with their supporter, who gave them two cups of rice a day, and a thousand Leones – “sauce money” for stew to go with the rice.

He also gave them cigarettes and bought them medicine when they were sick.

If they find a diamond, they get a share of the cash, which was split between the miner, the landowner and the supporter.

You can see what these windfalls might translate into as you pass the diamond buyers’ shops.
As soon as the miner has got his cash in hand, the dealer has goods ready for him to buy.

A small diamond might mean a bicycle or a boom box radio.

A bigger stone could mean a generator, a television and video, or a motorbike.

It could also set the young man up in a more reliable trade.

But mostly, the lure of the stones is too strong.

Why would someone bother with the safe and steady when there is a chance, however small, of making more money in a day than a carpenter or a motorbike boy could earn in his whole life?

I did meet one man, a prosperous, young dealer who had kept a level head and made the diamonds work for him.

Francis Konuwa’s family land lay in a prime location, along the Sewa river.

He was soon supporting other diggers, but they were usually his own brothers, so he was fairly sure that they would not cheat him by hiding their finds.

And now he is diversifying into retailing, foreign exchange dealing, and the import and export of diamonds.

The gambler who knows when to walk away from the table is the one who keeps his winnings.

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Kono, Sierra Leone. Diamonds are who’s best friend exactly? September 1st, 2007

I’m told the Kono diamond mining district of Sierra Leone was once a party town. The diamond wealth once brought with it streets lined with Mercedes and hookers.

A decade of civil war however put paid to all that. Being the most valuable part of the country, this is the area that saw the most fighting. I’d like to say the burned out homes like the one pictured is the exception but unfortunately in the old town they are more the rule. None the less the town has been rebuild enough at least for the diamond mining to continue.

Most of these photo’s are taken in an area still known as “little Lebanon”. Before the war, Kono was home to a lot of immigrant Lebanese miners. Most of them have gone now and taken their falafel with them. When war broke out, they mostly retreated to their safer and less war-torn homeland of Lebanon.I’m not going to comment on the sad irony of this.

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Diamond Imports

Fair Trade Diamonds Video

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The small town of Idar-Oberstein (population: 35,000), tucked away in the Hunsrück Mountains of the Rhineland-Palatine region, in the district of Birkenfeld, southwestern Germany, has a several hundred year history of mining and gem-cutting that has made it one of the leading cut-gem trading centers in the world.

Although primitive hand-dug mining in the Rhineland-Palatine region dates back several thousand years, mechanized mining operations for the extraction of agate, jasper and quartz within the vicinity of the towns Idar, and Oberstein, began in the late 1400s, creating a demand for gem-cutters, stone-carvers, and lapidary artisans to migrate to the area.

By the 1800s, precious and semi-precious colored gemstones were being shipped from around the world to be cut in Idar-Oberstein, and 100s of cutting houses and Ateliers had sprung up in the surrounding countryside, swelling the population to 50,000. By the late 1800s, wages in the area grew to be too expensive for the cutting of lesser materials and the cutting industry began to decline, forcing many of Idar’s gem-cutters to immigrate to Brazil.

Today, Idar-Oberstein is primarily known for the cutting larger, more valuable gemstones, fantasy cuts (Fantasieschliffe), and the wholesale trade in polished gemstones (geschliffenen Edelsteinen). Every year around September or October, Idar-Oberstein is host to the Intergem trade show (International Trade Fair for Precious Stones and Jewellery).

The “Fantasy Cut” or Fantasieschliffe. There is probably no person who is more famous at this relatively new art form than the German stone cutter Bernd Munsteiner. The Munsteiner family (Bernd, Tom and Jutta) at Atelier Munsteiner have been pushing the boundaries of stone cutting to their limits with their endlessly imaginative shapes and forms.

There are several gemological research institutes in Idar-Oberstein that include the ‘German Foundation for Gemstone Research’ (Deutsche Stiftung Edelsteinforschung – DSEF), Diamond Grading Laboratory (Diamant-Prüflabor GmbH – DPL), German Association for Gemstone and Jewellery Evaluation (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Edelsteinbewertung mbH – DEGEB), Research Institute for Gemstones and Precious Metals (Forschungsinstitut für mineralische und metallische Werkstoffe, Edelsteine/Edelmetalle GmbH – FEE), and the German Gemmological Association (Deutsche Gemmologische Gesellschaft e.V. (DGemG).

[ International Diamond Council (IDC)
There are Five Laboratories working to the IDC rules they are,
1. The Certificates Department of the Antwerp Diamond High Council HRD, Belgium;
2. The Swedish Testing Institute, Stockholm, Sweden;
3. The Jewellery Council of South Africa Laboratory SAJC, Johannesburg, South Africa;
4.The, Idar Oberstein, Germany.
5. The Diamond Certification Laboratory of Australia DCLA, Sydney, Australia .

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Diamond Imports

Excellent Cut Diamonds

George Switzer, the mineralogist who started the Smithsonian Institution’s vast collection of gems and minerals by acquiring the legendary, and some say bedeviled, Hope Diamond, died on March 23 in Solomons, Md. He was 92 and lived in Port Republic, Md.

The cause was pneumonia, his son Mark said.
Dr. Switzer, who also played a significant role in analyzing rocks brought back from the moon, was chairman of the mineral sciences department at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History from 1964 to 1969. He had been associate curator of the museum’s division of mineralogy from 1948 to 1964.

When Harry Winston, the renowned New York City jewelry merchant, decided to donate the 45.52-carat, steely-blue Hope Diamond to the Smithsonian in 1958, the arrangements were made by Dr. Switzer.

“That started the national collection,” Sorena Sorensen, the current chairwoman of the Smithsonian’s mineral sciences department, said in an interview Wednesday.

“At midcentury, great gemologists around the country were talking about building a national collection to rival the crown jewel collections of Europe,” Dr. Sorensen continued. “The idea for the national collection at the Smithsonian was a collaboration between Harry Winston and George.”

On Nov. 10, 1958, Mr. Winston’s wife, Edna, presented the Hope Diamond to Leonard Carmichael, then the secretary of the Smithsonian, and to Dr. Switzer. Soon after it went on display, the Hope — surrounded in a pendant by 16 white diamonds on a necklace containing 45 more white diamonds — became one of the museum’s premier attractions.

There are now about 15,000 gems, 350,000 mineral specimens, 300,000 rock and ore specimens and 35,000 meteorites in the Smithsonian collection, one of the most comprehensive in the world.

Dr. Switzer’s contributions went beyond acquisitions. In the 1970s, he played a central role in helping the museum get, through a grant from NASA, an electron probe micro-analyzer for minerals. The instrument, then new, allows scientists to determine a mineral’s origin; for example, whether it was crystallized from a molten state.

Using the micro-analyzer, Dr. Switzer and other mineralogists examined samples brought back from the moon by the Apollo 15 and 16 crews. Their work helped determine that the moon never had water on its surface and never had an atmosphere like Earth’s.

“This showed that museums could become places where cutting-edge science was carried out,” Dr. Sorensen said. “It put the Smithsonian at the forefront of instrumental technology in geology.”

Dr. Switzer also worked with other scientists on examining and naming five newly discovered mineral species. After three mineralogists — John S. White, Peter B. Leavens and Pier F. Zanazzi —analyzed pale brown crystals from North Carolina, they proposed that the manganese phosphate mineral be named in honor of Dr. Switzer. In 1967, the International Mineralogical Association approved the designation: Switzerite.

Born on June 11, 1915, in Petaluma, Calif., George S. Switzer was the son of Albert and Charlotte Ryan Switzer. Besides his son Mark, of Port Republic, Dr. Switzer is survived by his wife of 68 years, the former Sue Bowden; another son, James, also of Port Republic; eight grandchildren; and 12 great-grandchildren.

Dr. Switzer graduated from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1937, then earned a master’s degree in mineralogy in 1939 and a Ph.D. in 1942, both at Harvard. Before joining the staff at the Smithsonian in 1948, he taught at Stanford and Harvard.

As an associate curator, Dr. Switzer approached Mr. Winston and began sharing the dream of a national gem collection. Mr. Winston had bought the Hope Diamond in 1949 from the estate of Evalyn Walsh McLean, whose father had struck it rich in a Western gold rush.

There are gaps in the Hope’s provenance, but it is known to have passed through the hands of three French kings and Queen Marie Antoinette before being stolen during a looting of the crown jewels in 1792. It later came into the possession of King George IV of England and, in 1839, entered the collection of Henry Philip Hope, heir to a British banking fortune. Because of financial and other troubles that befell many of its possessors (Marie Antoinette lost her head), the diamond was said to be cursed.

When, in April 1962, Dr. Switzer carried the Hope to Paris for an exhibition at the Louvre, he began to wonder whether there was truth to the curse. Museum officials had determined that secrecy would the best security.

“My mother sewed this little velvet pouch and the Hope was put in the pouch and the pouch was safety-pinned to the inside of my father’s pants pocket,” Mark Switzer said. “The plane did a hard landing in Pittsburgh, almost tore the wing off.”

Upon arrival in Paris, nine hours late on the day the exhibition opened, Dr. Switzer got into a car with French officials. “They end up with a classic Paris fender-bender on the way to the Louvre,” Mr. Switzer said. “It was a running family joke.”

Additional Reading:

Mysterious Phosphorescence of the Blue Hope Diamond Solved

The Hope Diamond

***

Diamond Imports

Diamonds of Excellence

The rise and rise of Dan Gertler: at only 32 years of age, Dan Gertler has established himself as one of the most important players in the rough diamond business. With distribution agreements in the DRC and Angola under his belt, the Israeli diamantaire is known to savor purchasing Canada’s Ekati mine.

PRO

Dan Gertler – Founder and President

Founder of the DGI Group of Companies, Dan Gertler is a leader in the development of natural resources. His career began with investments in the diamond trade in Africa, and his interests have since grown to include mining, logistics, real estate, agriculture and finance in Africa and other emerging markets.

Born in December 1973, Dan Gertler is the grandson of Moshe Schnitzer, who was the founder and first President of the Israeli Diamond Exchange and 2004 winner of the Israel Prize (the most prestigious award issued by the State of Israel) for lifetime achievement in recognition of his contribution to Israeli society and the State.

Mr. Schnitzer was known to have encouraged his children (and grandchildren) to develop their own business enterprises, whether within or outside the diamond industry, and made family resources available for such purposes. It was within this family tradition of free and independent initiatives based on strong family backing and influence that Mr. Gertler was raised. Not only did he gain the courage and vision for his own ventures, but also the seed resources required to achieve that vision.

An enthusiastic diamond-dealer from youth, Mr. Gertler learned the secrets of the trade not only from his father but also from his grandfather’s life-long experience. He spent time with both of them during school holidays and whenever else he was able. Even while carrying out his three-year mandatory service in a rearguard base of the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) near Tel Aviv, all of his free time was spent either at the offices of his father or grandfather, learning and practicing the essentials of the diamond business.

Immediately following his mandatory service in the IDF, Mr. Gertler, then aged 21, went about opening his own diamond business. Naturally, his family provided him with an extensive infrastructure of contacts, goodwill and finance.

Since his financial backing provided him with the ability to purchase substantial amounts of stocks up-front, he soon made a name for himself as a reliable source of various types, sizes and qualities of diamonds. In turn, this key quality of ‘reliability’ enabled him to develop a large downstream clientele. Mr. Gertler’s deep knowledge of the industry gave him strength in finding the appropriate type of diamonds for clients, and together with the other factors mentioned, Mr. Gertler became able to sustain a long-term diamond dealership.

Mr. Gertler recognized, however, that no matter how good a dealership is, due to its dependence on various sources, it would always be exposed to risks of unsteady supply and it, therefore, carried an uncertain future. He believed that the closer one was able to get to the source – to the mine itself or at least to the miners – the better one’s chances of success in this ever-fluctuating and capital-intense market.

This, therefore, became his renewed focus. Following experiments with the purchase and marketing of artisinally mined diamonds in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, DGI established a partnership with the majority state-owned diamond mine MIBA.

The DRC was deemed to be an extremely high risk and volatile country, torn by civil war and absent of large international investments. Following political changes in the summer of 2001, the already volatile situation became even more unsteady. Shortly after the appointment by the state council of the late president’s son, Mr. Joseph Kabila, as the new president of DRC, Mr. Gertler pledged his commitment to assist the DRC through its most difficult period. His decision to commit a substantial part of his wealth in the DRC was made at a time when very few, if any, business people shared such a commitment.

Mr. Gertler’s record in the DRC not only gives him a unique view and understanding of its authorities and infrastructure, but also earned him the trust and goodwill required to build business interests of the magnitude that he has. Mr. Gertler was named honorary consul of the DRC in Israel in April 2003.

Today, Mr. Gertler maintains his diamond activities – located in and managed from his offices in Tel Aviv – and is involved in a number of other projects in Africa and other locations around the world. As he has great faith in the potential of emerging markets, he is also pursuing investments in Angola, East Europe, Brazil, and elsewhere.

Mr. Gertler studied business at the University of Derby and financial markets and gemology in Israel.

Mr. Gertler strictly observes the Jewish religion. He supports many and various educational and charitable institutions, most of them anonymously. Source: DGI Group of Companies

ANTI

” Torah says that a Jew can keep a slave, but a Jew kept as a slave must be redeemed, and that an empty, foolish justification for exploiting and terrorising innocent people is how religion falsifies spirituality and paves the road to hell. “

The Gertler Steinmetz

Bling Bang Torah Gang

Israel & The Ongoing Holocaust in Congo ( Part 1)

Posted by Keith Harmon Snow February 8th 2008

Maurice Templesman is one of big funders of Barrack Obama, Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party. Templesman was the unofficial ambassador to the Congo (Zaire) for years, always working the CIA and Mobutu to instill terror and steal minerals, but a new Israeli-American tycoon has replaced him.

In the world of bling bling and bling bang, some things change, some stay the same. The CIA, MOSSAD, the big mining companies, the offshore accounts and weapons deals—all are hidden by Western media. The holocaust in Central Africa has claimed some six to ten million people in Congo since 1996, with 1500 people dying daily.

But while Africans are victims of perpetual Holocaust, the persecutors hide behind history, complaining that they are the persecuted, or pretending they are the saviors. Who is responsible?

For Israeli-American Dan Gertler, business in blood drenched Congo is not merely business, it is a quest for the Holy Grail. Young Dan Gertler goes nowhere——does nothing——without the spiritual guidance of Brooklyn-born Rabbi Chaim Yaakov Leibovitch, a personal friend of Condoleeza Rice.

Gertler and Leibovitch are two of the principals behind a diamond mining company, Emaxon Finance Corporation, involved in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Gertler and gang won majority rights to the diamonds from the state mining company, Société Minière de Bakwange, MIBA, found near the government-controlled town of Mbuji-Mayi, the rough diamond capital of the world.Emaxon Finance Corp. has apparently out-maneuvered diamond competitors, especially the big rivals Energem and De Beers.

Energem is one of many shady mining companies connected to Anthony Teixeira, a Portuguese born businessman now residing in South Africa whose daughter married Congolese warlord Jean-Pierre Bemba. The warlord’s deadly battle in Congo in March 2007 was a bid between rival agents——Jean-Pierre Bemba and Joseph Kabila——to be the black gatekeeper for mining cartels run by dynastic families like Templesman, Oppenheimer, Mendell, Forrest, Blattner, Hertzov, Gertler and Steinmetz, and for companies like NIKANOR, whose stock prices rose early in July 2006 in expectation of a July 30th “win” for Joseph Kabila.

Africa Confidential called President Kabila’s 2003 visit to the Bush White House a “coup” for the Israeli diamond magnates Dan Gertler and Beny Steinmetz.Canadian-based Energem, formerly DiamondWorks, is owned by British mercenary Tony Buckingham and its director/shareholders include Mario and Tony Teixeira, J.P. Morgan, and Gertler’s partner Israeli-American Beny Steinmetz (50%).

Through subsidiary Branch Energy, the Energem-DiamondWorks gang has perpetuated war in 11 African countries.

In December 2007, Energem re-launched itself on the London Stock Market with the newly laundered image of a renewable energy company. Regarding diamonds, it said only it “had decided to give up exploration rights in the Central African Republic.”

The Energem spokesman explained that Tony Teixeira “had a clean bill of health” etc., etc. Of course, Energem “quit” the C.A.R. because Jean-Pierre Bemba marched his troops into C.A.R., where they raped and pillaged widely.

Energem is still operating in Congo, but Dan Gertler is the new, unofficial ambassador to the Congo for the George W. Bush gang.Gertler and partners like Beny and Danny Steinmetz, Nir Livnat, Chaim Leibovitz and Yaakov Neeman run a hornet’s nest of companies involved in African hotspots, including: Dan Gertler International (DGI), Steinmetz Global Resources, International Diamond Industries, NIKANOR and Global Enterprises Corporate.“Dan Gertler is ‘the new kid on the block,’” writes Yossi Melman in Israel’s Haaretz news. “Bold, sophisticated, brutal, he is an adventurer with a short fuse.” Haaratz confirmed that Dan Gertler owns a complex network of interconnected companies, often registered in offshore tax havens and involved in India, Russia, Belgium and the United States, and that Dan Gertler is looking to God for guidance.

THOU SHALT NOT STEAL
“In the diamond industry,” Melman wrote, “Gertler is considered something of an odd bird. He maintains few ties with the other merchants and is not very sociable… Alongside his business affairs, most of his energy is channeled into matters of faith.

He is a donor to religious institutions and from time to time makes a pilgrimage to the rabbi he most admires, Rabbi David Abuhatzeira, from Nahariya, in order to consult with him and receive his blessing. Gertler is surrounded mostly by religious people and laces his speech liberally with praise to God.”

In 2003, Condoleeza Rice, then Assistant to President Bush for National Security Affairs, introduced Dan Gertler and Chaim Leibovitch to U.S. official Jendayi Frazer, a Harvard Kennedy School affiliate and former National Security Council agent focused on Africa. On December 6, 2006, Frazer, then Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, was one of seven special Bush delegates sent to the inauguration of Congo’s newly installed President Joseph Kabila in Kinshasa.

When Dan Gertler and Chaim Leibovitch and their friends visit the luxury Gertler villa in Lumumbashi, the capital of Katanga, Congo’s large southern province, their kosher meals arrive by private plane from Kinshasa. The special executive jet that flies their kosher meals a few hundred miles over the roadless Congo costs some $US 23,000 per trip.

The average income for Congolese citizens each year——if they survive it——is about $95. Shootings at mining facilities and diamond mines are common, land is stolen from Congolese people, strikes are crushed by security forces that companies are partnered with, and black overseers of state terror routinely arrest and torture any vocal opposition——and sometimes disappear them——in support of white bosses. The Société Minière de Bakwange——MIBA——and the diamond fields of Mbuji-Mayi in Congo have a long history of bloodshed backed by Western powers, including Israel, from the beginning.

Amnesty International points out that not a single state agent has ever been prosecuted for the extrajudicial executions of suspected “illegal” miners in Mbuji-Mayi.

After a century of exploitation and slavery, we find MIBA consistently withholding payment of salaries to starving Congolese laborers and middle managers for months at a time. April and May 2007 saw strikes and protests leading to the Kabila government’s arbitrary arrest, detention and torture of trade union organizers like Leon Ngoy Bululu; police have also shot protestors.

So-called ‘illegal’ diamond workers——disenfranchised local Congolese people forced into “criminal” activities to survive——were summarily executed on MIBA concessions in Mbuji-Mayi. MIBA security guards have also been sniping unemployed diamond miners.

Meanwhile, Dan Gertler’s kosher meals depart Kinshasa, the capital of the big Congo, through the arrangements of Rabbi Chlomo Bentolila, high priest of the Chabad of Central Africa. Rabbi Chlomo Bentolila has been a Kinshasa Rabbi since 1991, and he was a spiritual force who survived the terrorism of the old dinosaur, Mobutu Sese Seko, the way most elites did: by working with him. Rabbi Bentolila is a member of the Chabad Lubavitch Global Emissary Network, headquartered in Brooklyn, New York, and his wife Miriam is the sister of Rabbi Mena’hem Hadad, a high priest in Brussels.

“Kosher does not mean that a Rabbi blesses the food,” Rabbi Betolila corrected me, “but rather that the food was supervised by a Rabbinical Thora [sic] authority who sees that the ingredients were in accordance with the laws of Kashrut expressed in the Bible (Leviticus and Deuteronomy).”

Dan Gertler often flies people into Congo, on his private jet, for sacred Jewish rituals. For the Bar Mitsvah of Rabbi Chlomo Bentolila’s son Binyamin Avrahim in June 2005, guests included eminent Rabbis, Hassidic singer Yoni Shlomo and special orchestra Yossef Brami, all arriving in “special flights” from Israel, New York and Brussels. The reception was held at the luxurious and exclusive Memling Hotel. Joseph Kabila sent a sizeable delegation but did not attend: his closest advisers provided a blessing on his behalf.

The Gertler, Steinmetz and Templesman interests are advanced in part through the support of the Committee of the Jewish Community of Kinshasa——le Comité de la Communauté Israélite——that is tightly coordinated with the power structure in Kinshasa to exert influence and assure control of Israeli-Belgian-Anglo-American interests over the geopolitical arena.

From June 26-30, 2007, the Communaute Israelite de Kinshasa received a visit from the Israeli Ambassador Yaakov Revah, director of the Africa Department of the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs; Revah also flew to Lumumbashi for meetings with Dan Gertler and his agents, including Moishe (Moses) Katumbi, the Governor of Katanga, and they most likely enjoyed a lovely, $23,000 kosher meal sent from the Chabad in Kinshasa.

The Communaute Israelite de Kinshasa maintains very intimate political relations with President Joseph Kabila’s PPRD party, the People’s Party for Reconstruction and Democracy. On March 1, 2006, in a formal ceremony, the President of the Communaute Israelite de Kinshasa, Ashlan Piha, was awarded the Congo’s Medal of Civil Merit.

THOU SHALT NOT COVET
Before his assassination on January 16, 2001, Laurent Desire Kabila——the President of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)— —made a deal with the Gertler gang that would play out in favor of the current President Joseph Kabila and, it seems, be a central factor in relation to both Congo’s ongoing war and the bloody warlord’s battle in Kinshasa in March 2007.

Back in 2000, former Congolese president Laurent Kabila offered a monopoly on Congolese diamonds, and 88% of the proceeds, to Gertler’s International Diamond Industries (IDI) in exchange for Israeli military assistance to his new government.

Top Congolese military officials apparently flew to Israel in 2000 to negotiate the deal. Gertler pledged military assistance to President Laurent Kabila through top Israeli officials.

The original Gertler-Kabila deal fell through after Laurent Kabila was assassinated for not cooperating with the Great White Fathers of industry (January 2001), but Gertler and Leibovitch and their disciples formed another company, Dan Gertler International, and advanced their Congo plan.

By 2002 Gertler’s company was the leading exporter of Congolese gems, controlling a diamond mining franchise worth about $US 1 billion annually.

In 2003, the mighty Congolese diamond parastatal Societe Miniere De Bakwanga (MIBA) ——which has been forever controlled by the Great White Fathers in Belgium, Israel and America——signed an exclusive contract with Gertler’s startup company, Emaxon Finance International.

The deal involved Israeli’s Foreign Defense Assistance and Defense Export Organization (SIBAT), and high-level Israeli defense and intelligence officials. Gertler and his buddies reportedly bribed Congolese officials and Angolan generals who, on and off, have commanded Angolan Army troops protecting Kinshasa, Congo’s capital.

Security for mining operations in Congo is provided by exclusive security companies like Overseas Security Services (OSS) one of the many DRC interests of Belgian billionaire tycoon Philippe de Moerloose. A member of the Kinshasa elite, de Moerloose supplies jets and other presidential toys to DRC President Kabila. In 2006, President Joseph Kabila’s campaign helicopter was at the centre of a legal battle involving Philippe de Moerloose.

De Moerloose’s companies operated in Mobutu’s Zaire from at least 1991, backing state terrorism and Western corporate plunder that was rendered invisible by the Western media. De Moerloose is also an adviser to European Union (EU) Commissioner——and diamantaire——Louis Michel.

Dan Gertler and Philippe de Moerloose were, reportedly, the only two white men who attended the wedding of Joseph Kabila and the two clearly share interests in “security” provided by OSS at MIBA and elsewhere in Congo. The April 2003 secret agreement signed between the Gertler/Steinmetz company Emaxon Finance and the Kabila government involved MIBA and two de Moerloose companies, OSS-Congo and Demimpex, and other firms. Overseas Security Services (OSS) operations are apparently grounded in the experience of top expatriate security operatives formerly involved with the biggest security firm in Mobutu’s Zaire.

According to OSS public relations materials, “these persons have a not unimportant experience in the safety of this country.”

Providing mine security, body-guard and protection services, OSS operates in Burundi, Ivory Coast, Rwanda, Dubai, South Africa, Republic of Congo (Brazzavile) and Belgium, placing them in cahoots with all sides warring and plundering eastern Congo today.

Emaxon Finance International is a real gem, one of these octopuses of mining tangled up with interlocking companies and subsidiaries based in specious geographical offshore “tax havens” that work to shield from prosecution people who are responsible for money laundering, weapons and drugs operations, assassinations and other terrorism.

NIKANOR is registered as an Isle of Man (UK) company, an offshore tax haven that helps to conceal criminal activities and maximize profits. NIKANOR directors include Dan Kurtzer, former U.S. ambassador to Israel (2001-2005) and Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Intelligence and Research under Madeleine Albright.

NIKANOR partners include Mende and Moshe Gertner [sic], Israeli property tycoons with vast holdings in London who control 22 percent of NIKANOR.

Another partner is Israeli-born Nir Livnat, managing director of Johannesburg-based Ascot Diamonds, a member of the Steinmetz Group of Diamond Companies, and a principal involved in numerous U.S.-based businesses from Miami to New York.

THOU SHALT NOT BEAR FALSE WITNESS
Back in 2001, when the Gertler enterprises surfaced in dirty diamond deals, public relations was handled by Lior Chorev, the “Special Strategic and Communications Consultant” to International Diamond Industries (IDI), and Chorev continued in this role to support Dan Gertler businesses.

Today, Lior Chorev is partnered with the brothers Yuval and Eyal Arad as director-owners of the Israeli marketing and public relations firm, ARAD Communications.

“We do work for Mr. Gertler on some of his business issues,” said Lior Chorev.

ARAD’s many clients include Dan Gertler companies, Los Angeles-based Coral Diamonds and an Israeli aeronautics weaponry manufacturer producing Unmanned Aerospace Vehicles (UAVs)——robotic weapons and intelligence platforms like those being used against the people of Congo today.

As a political strategist, Lior Chorev has worked for Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and current Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.

He has also participated in Israel-NATO defense planning conferences.

Dan Gertler is close to Israeli politicians, especially Avigdor Lieberman, head of the right-wing Yisrael Beiteinu party, and he is very close to diamantaire Beny Steinmetz, a good friend of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. Gertler’s inseperable friend, Chaim Leibovitz, is also very close to Lieberman, and was “a regular fixture” in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s offices.

Beny Steinmetz is considered to be one of the richest billionaires in Israel. The Steinmetz Group, controlled with his brother Daniel, is one of the biggest clients of the de Beers diamond syndicate. Steinmetz is also involved in an Israeli real estate group that purchased the assets of the British Haslemere real estate company for $1.46 billion. Steinmetz’s real estate partners include the billionaire Israeli investors David and Simon Reuben, and the Saudi Arabian Olayan Group, an investment company that is deeply connected with Bechtel Corporation.

The Steinmetz web site map of operations hides their involvement in war-torn Congo.

It seems Dan Gertler’s land grabs and exclusion in Congo have a lot in common with the current crimes against humanity being committed by Israel through its illegal partition in the Middle East.

On January 3, 2008, the Jerusalem Post reported that Lior Chorev was an integral part of past Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s advisers, and he was recently quoted to say that even though Sharon did not get to finalize Israel’s final borders (he suffered a debilitating stroke in 2006), the route of the security fence——which he decided——would ultimately serve as the basis for the border and as Sharon’s lasting legacy.

“He felt he needed to set the border because he didn’t trust the younger generations,” Chorev was quoted to say. “He knew the fence route by heart and the reason for every stretch of land being on one side or the other.”

In 2003, the U.N. Panel of Experts on war in Congo revealed that Emaxon Finance International is controlled by Israeli diamond traders Chaim Leibovitz and Dan Gertler.

Emaxon lists as its address an office in Montreal, Canada, but Emaxon’s majority shareholder is listed as FTS Worldwide, a nebulous global corporation whose business address is that of a firm of lawyers, Mossack Fonseca & Company, in Panama City. FTS Worldwide is registered with the U.S. Securities Exchange Commission to lawyer Andre Zolty of Geneva Switzerland. A copy of the MIBA—Emaxon contract was signed on 13 April 2003 by Israeli-Americans Yaakov Neeman and Chaim Leibovitz.

Yaakov Neeman is a founding partner of Herzog, Fox and Neeman, Tel Aviv, one of Israel’s top law firms, and he has held Israeli government cabinet and ministerial positions.

Neeman is on the Advisory Board of Markstone Capital Group, a very influential group of investment bankers, with Eli Hurvitz. On the board of Israel’s Teva Pharmaceutical Industries with Eli Hurvitz is Northrup—Grumman director Philip Frost.

Both Philip Frost and Maurice Templesman are top-level councilors for the American Stock Exchange. Eli Hurvitz sat on the International Advisory Counsel of Harvard University’s Belfer Center, 2002-2005, during the period when the Belfer Center and their intelligence operative Robert Rotberg formalized the “Kimberley Process” to officially whitewash blood diamonds.

Yakov Neeman is also a governor of the World Zionist Organization and Jewish Agency for Israel.

One of the main objectives of the Kimberley Process, and the Harvard Belfer Center’s role, was to protect the South African Oppenheimer and De Beers diamond cartels and their leading buyers and agents like Maurice Templesman and Beny Steinmetz.

Added to those diamond industry firms whitewashed by the Kimberley Process are all the Zionist diamond dealers and cartels that have risen like a phoenix out of the ashes of the Holocaust.

The Israeli-American enterprises of the Gertler/Steinmetz gang have proliferated and today are major shareholders or owners of diamond concessions in Congo’s Kasai province and copperbelt concessions in Katanga.

The copperbelt is the big money in Congo. Copper prices recently hit an all time high due to monopoly control by corporations and new applications in transportation, aerospace and weaponry. Cobalt is used in dye and paint processes for manufacturing. More importantly, it is elemental to superalloys used for tank armor, spacecraft, turbines, ship hulls, ship hulls, blast furnaces, refineries, petroleum drilling rigs, nuclear reactors and nuclear weapons.

Like coltan, or columbium-tantalite, cobalt is also used in cell phone batteries. The Katanga copperbelt is also rich in germanium, a rare metal used in optical fibers, infrared lenses and telecommunication satellites.

The entire military-industrial-prisons complex revolves around minerals like cobalt, niobium and heterogenite (cobalt oxide), yet the truth about what happens to African people in lands taken over by these mining companies is hidden by the corporate media. More and more land is being stolen, more and more atrocities committed, with less and less transparency, and less and less accountability, and fewer and fewer voices for the voiceless. And, as usual, there are always a lot of empty promises.

THOUGH SHALT HAVE NO OTHER GODS
Over the past fifty years, elite Israeli nationals have perpetrated conflict and injustice in Africa, fueled by and for minerals. Operatives associated with the Israeli military or intelligence services——the Mossad——maintain strategic criminal syndicates in competition and in partnership with other syndicates involving men like Philippe De Moerloose, Louis Michel, Viscount Etienne Davignon, John Bredenkamp and Tony Buckingham.

Israeli trained shock troops became Mobutu’s bodyguards, with Mossad advisers. According to a report by the American Jewish Committee: after 1980 “Mossad agents, military emissaries, and a small group of private businessmen… replaced diplomats as Israel’s main interlocutors with African leaders and political (mainly opposition) groups.” The report cites rising involvement of private defense and security interests, especially in Angola, DRC and Central Africa Republic, since 1992.

Israeli operatives and “businessmen” appear everywhere there is egregious suffering and dispossession. Dan Gertler’s forays into the bloody world of diamonds involve Israeli arms dealers Yair Klein, who is reportedly wanted by the U.S. for training Medellin drug-cartel militias in Colombia, and Dov Katz.

Klein was convicted by Israel (1991) for his involvement with groups that targeted and assassinated Colombian politicians, journalists, and police. Jailed in Sierra Leone in 1999, Klein was a field representative for Gertler in war-torn Sierra Leone and Liberia. Gertler also mingles with the Russian Military Brotherhood, a group of “retired Russian generals whom Gertler describes as good friends.”

Retired Israeli Defense Forces Colonel Yair Klein reportedly organized arms for diamonds networks in Sierra Leone and Liberia after President Charles Taylor was deposed. In 1999 Klein was arrested in Sierra Leone on charges of smuggling arms to the rebel Revolutionary United Front.

The U.N. also documented collaborations between Sierra Leone’ rebels and Lazare Kaplan agent Damian Gagnon; Lazare Kaplan International is one of the organized crime syndicates of Belgian-American Maurice Templesman.

The Steinmetz Group of companies are also involved in the bloody diamond fields of Sierra Leone, along with Energem (formerly DiamondWorks), the company described above that is connected to the white mercenaries depicted in Hollywood’s Blood Diamond propaganda film.

In December 2007, local people in Sierra Leone struggling to gain the smallest livelihood from their own resources were shot by police during peaceful protests against the Steinmetz-controlled Koidu Holdings site. It’s the same old local people’s story, happening everywhere. These were people from communities driven off their own land by mining companies that promised the world, cajoled the trusting people, and gave nothing after.

The Steinmetz gang called in the local paramilitary, a curfew was imposed and people were shot; the police, as usual, falsely claimed that protesters were armed.

Like most mining mafias in Africa, the Israeli octopus——organized crime syndicates, offshore subsidiaries, interlocking directorships and affiliated mercenaries——has gripped the very heart of Congo like an octopus grips and stuns its prey. Mining regulates the pulse of Congo, and foreign mining companies with their black sell—out agents are sucking the blood out of the people and the wealth out of the land.

The Gertler/Steinmetz interests apparently curry huge favors with Congo’s number two most powerful man, Augustine Katumba Mwanke, one of Joseph Kabila’s closest allies and financiers, former Governor of Katanga (1998-2001) and director of Australia’s Anvil Mining. The UN Panel of Experts (2002) cited Mwanke for illegal arms deals and plunder of Congo: Mwanke negotiated arms purchases through Belgian banks and the DRC mining company MIBA.

Reportedly, Mwanke personally clears $US 1,000,000 a day through his interests in Katanga mining deals.

Anvil Mining has been involved in massacres in DRC.

Anvil directors include former U.S. Ambassador Kenneth L. Brown, who served at U.S. embassies in Brussels, Kinshasa, Congo-Brazzaville and South Africa. Brown was Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Africa (1987-1989) under George Schultz and George H.W. Bush and Director of Central African Affairs (1980-1981). The former top internal intelligence and security chief of the United Nations Observer’s Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUC) has been worked for Anvil mining in Katanga since 2006.

THOU SHALT NOT RAPE AND PLUNDER
Gertler/Steinmetz interests have also been jostling for copper and cobalt concessions with Kinross-Forrest Group. Gertler has bought up or invested heavily in companies just to close them down. George Forrest also made the UN hit list of Congo’s looters and Forrest and his three sons helped bankroll Joseph Kabila’s 2006 election “victory”.

George Forrest’s daughter is reportedly married to the son of Louis Michel. Malta and George Forrest are controlling directors in Katanga Mining Limited.

Born as Entreprise Générale Malta Forrest, the Belgian Forrest interests have been pillars of exploitation in Congo since at least 1922, when they launched mining operations in Katanga. Forrest’s Katanga Mining directors include: three Canadians; Congo’s Jean-Claude Masangu Mulongo, a former Governor of DRC and high official at the IMF and World Bank; and the current Governor of the Central Bank of DRC.

The Forrest dynasty has munitions factories in Belgium and Kenya, and has partnered with OM Group, in Ohio [USA], dealing in Congo’s cobalt and coltan. Forrest International also operates in Europe, Burundi——involving him on both sides of Congo’s bloody war——and the Middle East.

Forrest interests in DRC include aviation, foods, plantations, construction, logging, copper and cobalt mining. Forrest companies are enmeshed in the coltan plunder in eastern Congo.
Katanga is the world’s richest mining metropolis, part of the vast copper belt that stretches across northern Zambia and southern Congo——and the home to unprecedented human misery due to state orchestrated repression and communities overrun with toxic mining, tuberculosis, cancers, immune disorders, racial discrimination and slavery. The Zambian copperbelt concessions over the border involve many of the same companies and interests mentioned above, and others.

Workers and communities in and around these mines suffer all the standard treatable maladies (typhoid, malaria, tetanus, polio, malnutrition) as well. However, such stories are off the agenda for the North American, European, Japanese, Australian and Israeli media corporations providing the mainstay of English language indoctrination meant to instill racial superiority and a vast ignorance and obliviousness that leaves westerns populations shaking their heads and wringing their hands and clicking their tongues, while all the while wondering “what is to be done?” It does not cross people’s minds that their own hands are dirty, that their own consciousness has been falsified, as all the raw materials from Congo enrich the lives of people in the United States, Canada, Europe and Israel.

The immediate capital investment required for just one Gertler project in Katanga——the Komoto Oliveira Virgule (KOV) project——is reportedly $US 1.8 billion dollars, income to kick start billions of dollars of unused equipment mothballed in the middle Mobutu era. There are rumors that Bechtel is involved, but the KOV project involves ThyssenKrupp AG as a minor player.

The Krupp firm is one of several German firms involved in the plunder in eastern Congo, exploitation which involves the DeutscheGesellschaft für technische Zusammenarbeit——GTZ——a “German technological cooperation agency” whose Supervisory Board has representatives of four Federal [German] Ministries.

Krupp industries use coltan and cobalt for superalloys.

[ After Adolf Hitler came to power in Germany in 1933, the Krupp works became the center for German rearmament. In 1943, by a special order from Hitler, the company reverted into a family holding, and Alfried Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach (1907-67) took over the management. After Germany's defeat, when Gustav proved incapable of going on trial, the Nuremberg Military Tribunal convicted Alfred as a war criminal in the Krupp Trial for his company's use of slave labor. It sentenced him to 12 years in prison and ordered him to sell 75% of his holdings. In 1951, as the Cold War developed and no buyer came forward, the authorities released him, and in 1953 he resumed control of the firm.
In 1999, the Krupp Group merged with its largest competitor, Thyssen AG; the combined company — ThyssenKrupp AG, became Germany's fifth-largest firm and one of the largest steel producers in the world. ]

Dr.-Ing. Ekkehard D. Schultz, a ThyssenKrupp director, is also a director of Bayer AG, the Germany firm whose subsidiary H.C. Starck was named for its involvement in the ongoing illegal plunder of coltan and cassiterite (tin) in eastern Congo. NIKANOR director Jay Pomrenze is also a consultant for the Deutsche Bank.

Certain German and U.S. firms benefit from the military occupation of Rwandan-backed warlord Laurent Nkunda in North Kivu, DRC, where Nkunda controls the Lueshe niobium mine “owned” by Gesellschaft fuer Elektrometallurgie GmbH, a subsidiary of New York-based Mettalurg Group.

HONOR THY FATHER AND THY MOTHER
Dan Gertler’s grandfather, Moshe Schnitzer (d. November 2007), was known in Israel as “Mr. Diamond;” in youth he joined the pre-state underground organization Etzel (Irgoun), an Israeli military cell self-defined as an “untra-nationationalist Jewish militia,” but one that committed acts of terrorism in service to the Israeli cause.

Moshe Schnitzer assumed a major role in the Africa-Israeli diamond trade in the 1950’s in a partnership business called Schnitzer-Greenstein. Schnitzer later founded the Israel Diamond Exchange in Tel Aviv in 1960, which today brings Israel $14 billion annually in blood business, and is the country’s second-largest industry, but Israel’s top export. King Leopold III of Belgium decorated Schnitzer in recognition of his activities favoring the close relationship of Belgium, Israel and the DeBeers diamond cartels, and Schnitzer was also President of the Harry Oppenheimer Diamond Museum in Israel.

The diamond jewelry trade in the United States is more than $30 billion annually, and 99%——everything that is not synthetic or artificial diamonds—involves blood diamonds and the above organized crime syndicates. Israel buys more than 50% of the world’s rough diamonds, and the U.S. buys two-thirds of these. The diamond factories are located in Nethanya, Petach Tikvah, Tel Aviv, Ramat Gan, Jerusalem, and other cities around the country, but most of the offices were in Tel Aviv in the financial district on Ahad Ha’am Street.

Dan Gertler’s father, Asher Gertler, and his uncle, Shmuel Schnitzer, manage the original family business, and Shmuel is Vice-Chairman of the Belgian-based World Diamond Council——the entity that spends more money promoting the false image of “conflict-free” diamonds than it does helping any of the people dispossessed or brutalized by the diamond industry.

On August 16, 2007 Rabbi Bentolila in Kinshasa received a communication asking: “What does the Torah say about men exploiting other men for vast profits while other men are starving and dying all around them? Is there some hierarchy to the Torah that suggests, for example, that black people or Africans are lesser beings, and therefore not to be a concern where profound profits are being made?”

There was no reply from Rabbi Bentolila, he was apparently busy readying for another Bar Mitzvah in Belgium. Unfortunately for Dan Gertler and his spiritual advisers, the Torah says that a Jew can keep a slave, but a Jew kept as a slave must be redeemed, and that——an empty, foolish justification for exploiting and terrorizing innocent people——is how religion falsifies spirituality and paves the road to hell.

Additional Reading on Past Belgian Atrocities & More:

The Crime of the Congo By Arthur Conan Doyle Historical

King Leopold II of Belgium Killer File Historical

Belgium’s Imperialist Rape of Africa Historical

ILLICIT DIAMONDS FLOW Current

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DGI Group of Companies

Business Vision – DGI aims to achieve extraordinary business results for itself and its stakeholders through diversified long-term investments, cultivating the vision to see opportunities in developing markets and the courage to take the necessary risks.

Partnership – DGI strives to deliver mutual benefits by partnering with communities, nations and investors alike. Reinvesting earnings builds broader, more diversified economies and strengthens both business interests and communities.

Ethical Leadership – DGI is committed to be “best in class” in business ethics and corporate responsibility, giving back to its communities and ensuring ethical behavior at all of its operations. DGI abides by and sets best practices within the natural resources industry.

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Historical Feature

KANANGA, Democratic Republic of Congo, November 1 /PRNewswire/ — Mr. Dan Gertler, President of the DGI Group of Companies, based in TelAviv, Israel, announced today that the Emaxon Polishing plant in Kananga,Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), which has been operational for severalmonths, will soon go into full production.

The DGI Group of Companies began construction of the plant in August 2004 and completed the multi-million-dollar project in less than 12 months.

In the first phase, the plant will employ more than 300 employees, all of whom received professional training at the plant as polishing diamonds.

When full production begins, the state-of-the-art diamond polishing plant, the first of its kind in the DRC and Central Africa, will employ as many as 600 workers.

When in full production, the unique plant will polish, sell locally, andexport to the leading markets in the world, diamonds mined exclusively in theDRC, indirectly injecting hundreds of thousands of dollars into the Kanangaeconomy on a monthly basis.

The plant is fully equipped with state-of-the artsawing, brutting, and polishing tables.

The completion of this project, which is one of many DGI Group of Companies investments in the DRC, reaches beyond economic boundaries.

The Emaxon Polishing plant has already had an immediate social impact on Kananga, the capital of Kasaï Occidental Province, central DRC.

In addition,the creation of the polishing plant and the planned considerable transfer of technology, which will take place, in part, in the plants polishing and cutting training school, have the potential to create the foundation for long-term sustainable development in the region.

“This outstanding investment will have a positive, far-reaching, and large social and economic impact on Kananga, Kasaï Occidental Province, and the greater DRC,” stated Kasaï Occidental Province Governor Claudel Lubaya,who was instrumental in bringing the plant to Kananga.

The stable and improving economic and political climate in the DRC, which is steadily restoring confidence in the international community, was animportant factor in Mr. Gertler’s investment here.

While many competitorsview the DGI investment as a “risk,” Mr. Gertler’s pioneering move is one that he hopes other international investors will follow.

“President Kabila’s leadership has changed the business climate throughout the country, putting faith in international investors, which I believe has made this DGI investment a reality,”continued Governor Lubaya.

“Kananga is a remote place in Africa that is in need of more local and international investment. We look forward to others following DGI’s bold lead and investing in the Congolese population and the future of our country. ”

The DGI Group of Companies has been operating in the DRC for more thanfive years, through its subsidiary Emaxon Finance International, who markets 88 per cent of the DRC’s largest diamond mine, MIBA.

Among its investments,DGI recently provided nearly US$15 million to finance the purchase of a new kimberlite washing plant and a massive drag line that will boost MIBA’s diamond production to 8.5 million carats annually.

“I greatly appreciate President Kabila’s courageous leadership and economic reforms that have enabled DGI to continue to invest in the DRC,”stated Mr. Gertler. “Our Kananga polishing plant is a job creator that will have a positive impact on hundreds of families.

Emaxon will continue to work with the goal of turning Kananga into the diamond polishing center of the DRC and all of Africa.”

Emaxon, now the largest employer in Kananga, is working closely with the Ministry of Mines and the Centre d’ Evaluation et d’Expertise de Matieres Precieuses au Congo (CEEC) to ensure that the polishing plant is incompliance with domestic and international regulations, including the Kimberly Process.

The Emaxon Polishing plant, which is currently operating ata fraction of its full capacity, will immediately advance to full production when the DRC Parliament finalises legislation relating to the export of polished diamonds.

“It’s a great day for the Democratic Republic of Congo and for Central Africa to finally enter downstream of the diamond production process,” said DRC President Joseph Kabila. “The trend to add value in the country of originis a growing development in diamond producing countries in sub Saharan Africa and we welcome DGI’s investment in the DRC to that end.”

DRC’s Minister of Mines Ingele Ifoto added that “this is a perfect example of the local population benefiting from our national resources. We have been talking about diamond polishing in Congo for the last ten years and we can and should only support such an action.”

The DRC is expected to hold its first democratic elections in early 2006,brining its transitional government to an end.

More than 18 million Congolese have registered to vote in next year’s elections.

International observers are hailing the peaceful voter registration project, which is still ongoing, as a remarkable achievement for a country still recovering from a brutal five-year war.

For further information contact: DGI Spokesman Lior Chorev +972-546699339

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De Guru Comments: Keith Harmon Snow has some very valid points but over one hundred and fifty years of gentile exploitation of the Congo and everyone blames the Jews ?

Ask yourself what have the previous colonial invaders done for the Congo until Leviev, Gertler and Steinmetz appeared on the scene ?

The Congonese nationals, Germans and the Belgians have been in the Congo a lot longer but Mr Snow only glosses over this fact briefly in his article hardly mentioning their ” accomplishments ” before or during the turmoil of the last one hundred years. What was the Nazi family Krupp doing in Germany during World War II ? Making arms for Hitler ! and what have they done to assist the unfortunates in the Congo during all this time? Nothing.

Without foreign investment their will be no future !

Despite what people may think of the Gertlers and Steinmetzs of this world, they are offering a lot more than their predecessors.

Making Jews or Zionists the scapegoats on how they decide to practise their faith or politics has no relevance to the affairs of the Congo other than fostering ammunition for those anti semites who have conveniently forgotten that one of many of the recipients of conflict diamonds were Hezbollah and the reason why so many innocent people were slaughtered not to mention the past forgotten history of Belgian occupation with all it’s unaccountable atrocities.

In light of this obvious past unaccountability of other imperialists, Keith Harmon Snow’s insight on Jewish influence in the Congo could be seen as helpful and inspiring because for once the indigenous nationals of the Congo as in Botswana will be benefiting.

Snow’s misconstrued bias and perceived dislike of any Jewish or Israeli enterprise by falsely associating it with Zionism by definition alone is both ludicrous and inflammatory mischief making typical of those anti semites who continually pervert the facts.

What were the Catholics, Belgians and Germans with their missionaries doing in Africa the last one hundred and fifty years ? Not much unless murder and stealing is okay.

Did they compensate ? No.

I requote Mr Snow as follows: ” an empty, foolish justification for exploiting and terrorising innocent people——is how religion falsifies spirituality and paves the road to hell. “

Let’s Blame the Zionists.

Correct me if I am wrong but the Vatican and Papacy despite being theologically inaccurate, with it’s extra territorial exploits and white European associates, are certainly a lot older than any Zionist and the track record of Christian missionary influence in Africa is well documented in regard to the hardship of most black Africans but finding the Zionist scapegoat responsible and equated with this geographic anolamy begs the question why.

In the meantime The Russians are coming The Russians are coming…….. panic panic

Let’s blame those Zionists…again !

For Mr Snow’s benefit I conclude as follows: Those who point have three fingers pointing back at them.

Before blaming Jews or Israelis and falsely associating them as being Zionist demagogues perhaps Mr Snow should learn some basic history instead of pontificating over the evils of imperialistic free enterprise no matter what race or creed that person is especially only until the Israelis appeared on the African scene the plight of most black Africans had been a disaster during the last one hundred and fifty years.

Thankfully Africans are benefiting now and their standard of living will improve with the new wealth being created now that dictators are slowly disappearing and most diamond mining companies have an attitude of cooperation and partnership.

Daniel F Katz GG Diamond Imports Sydney NSW Australia 2000

Undersea mining was the stuff of fantasy in the 1800s when Jules Verne wrote the classic novel 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.

But it is not such a strange concept for Perth-based company Bonaparte Diamond Mines, who is one of several companies dredging for diamonds off the African coast.

Bonaparte is Australia’s only marine diamond miner, and one of only a hand full of similar operators in the world.

However, it is not only diamonds that Bonaparte’s executives are excited about.
As part of digging for diamonds Bonaparte have discovered something else of value in the process.

Bonaparte’s chief executive Mike Woodborne says the southern African nation of Namibia, on the Atlantic coast is well known for its unique deposits of gems.
“Off the coast in Namibia it’s renowned as a world unique deposit of gem quality diamonds,” he told AM.

“The diamonds have travelled 1,000 kilometres from the hinterland of Africa down mighty rivers like the Orange, where they’ve been tumbled through quite strenuous environments, only the best-quality survive.

“So off the coast of Namibia you’ll find 95 per cent gem quality diamonds strewn on the beaches above and below the present sea level.”

Bonaparte has also discovered the seabed off Namibia is rich in marine phosphates which can be used to make fertiliser.

“We’ve known about our potential for marine phosphates off the coast of Namibia for a while,” Mr Woodborne said.

“Developing these comes as a natural extension of our marine investigations into exploration and mining of diamonds and it’s been a great development that the price has changed, making the commodity now a viable consideration for the company.”

While undersea mining may sound like Jules Verne stuff, many people would be surprised to know it is an exercise that has been going on for some time.

Mr Woodborne says the dredging techniques used in mining undersea phosphates and diamonds are becoming standard practices.

“Certainly in the diamond sector that’s been happening since the early 1960s,” he said.
“But more so in the case of our marine phosphate projects, what we’re dealing with is the standard of marine dredging which is happening around the world in many places, in Hong Kong and Singapore, Dubai.

“Where we’re dealing with a movement of material off the seabed as a standard dredging process which the Dutch and the Belgians have been masters of for many, many years now.”
Mr Woodborne says despite the operations taking place out to sea, the work is now well understood.

“These particular project areas are going to be approximately 40 kilometres off the coast in an environment which operations have been ongoing in the marine diamond industry for many years now,” he said.

“So the operational environments are pretty well understood.”

Environmental impact

As has been seen recently in Australia with the Port Philip Bay project, dredging can be a controversial practice because of its potential impact on the environment.

However, Mr Woodborne says that because diamond mining and dredging is such an established practice in Namibia, there is legislation in place to effectively manage the industry.

“Namibia must be one of the few countries in the world that has established a marine diamond mining industry, or offshore diamond mining industry,” he said.

“They’ve got well placed legislation, management programs et cetera to establish baselines, so certainly there will be minor impacts.

“It all comes down to what percentage of that environment that we are going to be influencing and in those vast areas of the coast we are likely to be only influencing a very small percentage of the ground.

“We’ll do so in terms of established mining practices with the Namibian Government.”

Measures are also taken to rehabilitate the areas once dredgers have gone through and scraped the undersea surface.

Mr Woodborne says practices applied in the diamond mining industry aim to replace a large proportion of the material that is not needed in the final product.

“It’s a case of putting the tailings directly over the ground that’s been mined so it’s almost an immediate replacement of a large portion of the material,” he said.

“After that it’s allowing the ocean to do its normal work of regenerating itself and re-establishing itself.”

- Adapted from a story first aired on AM

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Diamonds – Diamond Imports

Diamonds of Excellence

” Diamond World Supply To End In 20 Years “

so says Diamond Expert CEO Paul Loudon of DiamondCorp.

Loudon said that the world was consuming more diamonds than mines were producing and therefore the price outlook for diamonds was ‘very strong’ in the medium-to-long term.

We saw this happening just last week as Rapaport, a Diamond trade Publication reported price increases of 10% for better quality goods.

With Platinum and Gold prices already up over 50% over the past five months, consumers are none too happy.

But guys are getting engaged.

Read Louden’s full interview here: Where Have All The Diamonds Gone?

De Guru Comments:
This comment about diamonds drying up in the next twenty years contradicts comments made by ALROSA at the third annnual rough diamond conference in Israel two months ago.

ALROSA confirmed they have estimated Russian reserves amounting to USD$109.3 BILLION for the next 35 years and this does not include any new exploratory ventures.

In a short presentation before the participants of the Third International Rough Diamond Conference, Alrosa President Sergei Vybornov stated that Alrosa has reserves valued at $109.3 billion.

Vyboronov noted that four of Alrosa’s mines are to be transferred underground soon. “In the past year we found two significant kimberlite pipes with reserves estimated at about $5 billion,” Vibornov noted.

He added that while the demand for diamonds is increasing, the supply of diamonds worldwide is “slightly stuck.”

“While the future of Alrosa and Russia promises to be great, the market has posed some challenges for us. We must combine forces and in this case, Alrosa will claim a leading role.”

It might be drying up in Africa maybe ? De Beers has recently invested USD$83 million in a well publicised processing and cutting plant in Botswana.

Let’s not forget also that Canada, Alaska, China, Australia, Brazil etc etc are all huge diamond mining concerns also.

Sometimes you have to wonder if these sort of comments made by those who wish to promote diamonds are self destructive in the possible misinformation they portray to the public consumer.

Comments such as those by Mr Loudon are intended to cause interest , panic buying and then perhaps shortages in the short term therefore possible price increases in the short term but these off the cuff comments are without foundation and irresponsible after so much evidence by other miners has proved to be quite the opposite.

Why would a CEO of a diamond mining company say this ? Maybe Mr Loudon really has no idea what is going on in the diamond industry and he is just another overpaid mouthpiece.

Stories like this one about diamonds are in my opinion very lame and serve no useful purpose in promoting the marketing of diamonds because it is simply not factually correct.

There is nothing wrong with self promoting yourself, your diamond mine or your diamonds but NOT to the possible detriment of diamonds’ future by making misinformed comments about shortages that may be misrepresentive in the future.It’s does not inspire public confidence in diamonds.

There will always be shortages or increases in certain diamond sizes and diamond grades but this is why there is a diamond market no different to those property investors who are seeking a particular size home in chosen location.

You can see the similarity here between diamond marketeers and property realtors. Diamonds are a luxury product that have to be carefully marketed in order not to pervert the publics’ perception of them similar to the way a realtor would market an up-market home in an exclusive suburb in order to retain the best possible price but this has to be done with integrity and correct information.

IDI Chairman Moti Ganz, speaking at a session devoted to “Producer Strategies,” at the 3rd Annual Rough Diamond Conference held two months ago in Tel Aviv disputed claims that there is not enough rough in the pipeline.

“There is no shortage of rough. But even more than that – we also have plenty of polished.Manufacturers have accumulated stock in an unprecedented volume of $14 – 17 billion,” he said.

Ganz called on producers to refrain from the use of tenders and auctions, which he said hurts manufacturers and the rough producers themselves. He also implored producers to spend 3% of sales turnover on generic advertising of diamonds, saying that this must not be left to a single producer.

Mr Ganz said ” the investment in marketing must be more sophisticated than that of other luxury items.”

Loose Certified Diamonds

A scene you will probably never get to see.

This is the sunset at the North Pole with the moon at its closest point.

You also see the sun below the moon.

An amazing photo and not one easily duplicated.

You may want to pass it on to others.

” When someone shares with you something of value,

you have an obligation to share it with others “

Chinese Proverb

Passover begins Saturday Sunset April 19th Full Moon

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Diamond Imports

Excellent Cut Diamonds

These price increases are the largest since the Polished Price Index was initiated in 2004, and they are greater than the record price gains last month.

For the month of March 2008, average global polished diamond prices were up sharply, +2.0 percent, versus average diamond prices during February 2008.

March’s month-to-month leap from February ‘s increase of 1.6% was the largest gain on record since 2004 and represents an increase of 24% per annum.

There appear to be five key factors that are driving diamond prices sharply higher:

1) Solid demand from most markets, except the U.S. and Japan
2) Rising costs throughout the diamond pipeline
3) Weakening U.S. dollar, the international currency for the diamond market
4) Global rise in the price of virtually all commodities which has spilled over into the diamond market
5) Stock market volatility, the last of which has caused some traders to move their wealth into diamonds, precious metals, and other assets that may hold their value, until the financial markets recover.

The big question is will these diamond price increases hold at retail, or will merchants negotiate them down?

In the meantime the western alliance has the pending Iranian nuclear arms issue to contend with by far the most serious threat to world peace because the mental cases who are in charge of Iran are just as likely to blow themselves up in the fracas at the same time because of their proximity to everyone they hate.

Only time will tell who the victor or the loser is but commodities have a wonderful way of influencing peoples’ and governments’ hip pockets in times of conflict, recession and inflation and most of us are mere pawns playing our part until we are either eliminated or left standing on the great chess board of life. None of us are in control so all we can do is limit the risks by the decisions we make.

In times of instability investing in diamonds can present a concentrated portability of wealth for those who need to flee an oppressive regime.

***

Even though the U.S. is in a recession, demand from other regions of the world is expected to push diamond prices higher during 2008. As long as the demand for diamonds and diamond jewelry remains strong, especially in emerging markets, prices are expected rise.

Further, since rough diamond prices have been rising faster than polished diamond prices, there is ongoing pressure to pass along those price increases.

Because rough diamond prices are rising at a pace faster than polished diamond prices, there is much pressure on cutters and polishers to raise their prices, a trend that is likely to continue.
Part Source: International Diamond Exchange abridged

Hooorooo from De Guru

Diamond Prices

DTC Sightholder Pluczenik has announced that it will premier the largest matching pair of Forevermark stones at BaselWorld next month. The pair is made up of two 26 carat round diamonds, cut from the same approximately 141 carat stone by Pluczenik, with an estimated value of over $5 million.

Up to this point, the diamonds have been shown at private events in New York, Tokyo and Moscow, but BaselWorld will be the first time they will be on public display.

The company commented that, in displaying these stones, the public is provided with an opportunity to learn about the aims of the Forevermark program – part of an effort to ensure that the diamonds are mined and produced according to the highest ethical principles.

The Forevermark is a DTC program that marks diamonds with a special symbol and identification number unique to each diamond, providing an assurance to consumers that their diamond meets the ethical standards of the DTC.

Forevermarked diamonds are genuine, natural, and untreated. Every diamond is accompanied by a Certificate of Authenticity reassuring consumers that their stone was mined, cut, and polished in an ethically, socially, and environmentally responsible way.

Recently De Beers announced that it is expanding the scope of the program and planning to add non-Sightholders.

The mark is available on diamonds of 0.30 carats and above, sourced from the DTC and polished by one of several authorized Sightholders.

The 1/20 of a micron deep (only 1/500th the thickness of a human hair) mark is inscribed with by the DTC and can be seen with the Forevermark viewer.

***

Forget the news of the revised Diamond Trading Company (DTC) Sightholder list. A far more significant De Beers decision, which was posted this week through an innocuous letter on the DTC intranet, will have far more ramifications than anything else on future Sightholder status and the meaning of Sightholder value. De Beers has decided that the Forevermark, which hitherto was a specific privilege held by Sightholders, will now become accessible to any diamantaire in the world and apply also to non-De Beers mine output. There’s only one limitation: the diamantaire must meet certain criteria such as Best Practice Principles (BPP).

*

This BPP “limitation” has no real meaning since, as we’ve written before, De Beers – so far – has lacked the political will or the commercial sense to enforce BPP. (I won’t even mention the “zero tolerance” policy that was contained in the former managing director Gary Ralfe’s various statements on introducing BPP.) As it stands today, a fraudulently upgraded certificated stone or a stone bought with laundered money would still be entitled to a Forevermark. Having said that, from a De Beers perspective, this new Forevermark policy – if successful – will have consequences far beyond the composition of any Sightholder list or rough allocation policy. It is a brilliant (though not unexpected) move by the company.

A large and shimmering pear-shaped white diamond is expected to fetch more than $10 million at an auction in Hong Kong next week along with a host of other glimmering jewels.

The 72.22 carat gem is the largest pear-shaped D-colour flawless diamond to ever appear at auction in Asia and is expected to draw fierce bidding.

The pear-shaped white diamond may be among the top most-expensive diamonds to ever be auctioned, but is likely to be priced behind two diamonds sold in Europe over the past few years.

Cut from an original rough diamond weighing 188.11 carats mined in southern Africa, the diamond to be offered in Sotheby’s spring auction is known for its outstanding brilliance and clarity.

Play Video

16th April 2008 : Sothebys fails to sell 72 carat diamond in auction- but does sell !

TRADE ALERT

The Gemlab Research Newsletter dated March 23 reports that more fake diamond crystals, “ingeniously designed rough diamond imitations,” have appeared in the trade.

Noting the beautiful craftsmanship of the crystals to appear like diamond, Thomas Hainschwang of GEMLAB, Laboratory for Gemstone Analysis and Reports in Balzers, Liechtenstein, who sent the report, observed that the crystals were noticeably void of trigons, the triangular etch marks commonly found on octahedral diamond crystals.

That led to some basic testing with Polaroid plates which determined that the crystals could not be diamond. Hainschwang says that phenakite as the likely substitute.

***

” In the GEMLAB Newsletter 12/2007 from the 24/12/2007 we reported on phenakite being represented as diamonds or some diamond-like material; the unusual property of the analyzed material to indicate “diamond” on the rapid diamond-testers that we had on hand was indicated in this newsletter.

The facetted brilliant cut stone was easily identified as being non-diamond because it exhibited the material-specific very much lower dispersion, luster and brilliance than expected for diamond.

Now, two months later, we have analyzed a parcel that was supposed to be composed of top quality rough diamonds and it certainly looked like that at first glance, but was found to be the most convincing rough diamond forgery we have ever seen. “

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Diamond Imports

Diamonds Independently Certified

Designed by Emmanuel Gueit, production was limited to three units. Called “LeMillion”, it is handcrafted from 18-carat gold and is available in rose, yellow or white gold, with 120-carat diamonds encrusted all over it.

Handmade in Switzerland, it comes with a 2GB memory, quad-band for worldwide reception, an 8x digital zoom camera, MP3 player, Bluetooth and FM radio.

However, GoldVish also offers other diamond-encrusted 18k gold models starting at the more reasonable price of $25,600.

Those who would love a less expensive rival can go for the iPhone Princess Plus made by Australian designer and jeweller Peter Aloisson, which costs $176,400 (Dh647,388).

The Princess Plus iPhone is encrusted with 318 diamonds of 17.75 carats – 138 of which are princess-cut, which is why the phone is named Princess Plus – with the other 180 brilliant-cut, all set in an 18-karat white gold rim.

The Princess Plus already has its first customer: the phone has been purchased by a Russian businessman, who received his extravagant handset earlier this year.

And there seem to be others in Russia willing and able to flaunt such uber-luxury mobile handsets. Euroset in Russia has imported a GoldVish phone and plans to open a GoldVish boutique in Moscow some time next year.

Those who would like a “slightly cheaper” version of the iPhone Princess Plus, can purchase the brilliant-cut diamond version at a price of $66,150. All the diamonds used on the phone are top-quality and clear ones.

The Princess Plus has the same 8GB iPhone chassis and incorporates the same features on the regular iPhone, such as the touch screen, e-mail capability, video camera and web browser.
People in the UAE are currently unable to buy the official guaranteed iPhone, as UAE regulators do not allow Apple an exclusive network service in the market.

The Telecommunications Regulatory Authority does not permit telecom companies in the UAE to set up exclusive rights for iPhone services. Unlocked versions of the phone are being sold by third parties in the UAE. However, Apple offers no support for these phones.

While the Princess Plus is not cheap it can be argued it is reasonably priced compared to the GoldVish Le Million.

Those who want the glamour of GoldVish, but not on the iPhone chassis, can find an array of phones that have received the Aloisson treatment, such as the Nokia Communicator E90.
The device is made of solid platinum and 18-carat rose gold, and lined on both sides by 25 half-carat princess cut diamonds.

There is also the Ancort Diamond Crypto Smartphone with 3,000 diamonds of top quality priced at €350,000 (Dh1.28 million), the Motorola V4688-90 studded with 1,200 diamonds going for $78,000, and the Sony Ericsson T68, an 18-carat yellow and white gold-studded phone with 892 diamonds, priced at $29,000.

Aloisson is a jeweller renowned for mixing latest technology and gadgets with art and jewellery.
In 1998, he designed his first diamond encrusted phone, the Motorolla V4688-90, and later broke the record for the world’s most expensive mobile phone with the Le Million. Aloisson also designs interiors and furniture. Source

There is no more immediately recognisable romantic gesture than a marriage proposal on bended knee.

But where did this custom originate, and why is it so popular today?

History of the Marriage Proposal on Bended Knee

There is no clear historical origin of the idea of proposing with a bent knee, but the gesture bears striking resemblance to many other ceremonial situations, including:

* Kneeling during prayers and other religious ceremonies, including wedding vows for some faiths.

* Kneeling while proposing, then, has the same solemn and spiritual connotation.

* Knights kneeling while being awarded honors from kings and queens.

* Offering or accepting a marriage proposal is just as much an honor as any medal or award.

* Bowing in supplication before a victorious enemy, typically as a gesture of surrender.

* Committing to a relationship is surrendering oneself to being part of a couple.

* Kneeling to genuflect when entering a church or temple.

* Again, proposing on bended knee is a sign of respect and spiritualism.

Regardless of the origin, the idea of asking for a loved one’s hand in marriage while partially kneeling is a highly symbolic gesture embodying the very essence of committing one’s life to another: the ideas of goodwill, honor, and trust in that one person is opening themselves completely to another without shame or any physical defenses.

The practical reason behind a bent knee proposal is that it puts the engagement ring in an elevated position between the couple, letting the light hit it clearly without being blocked by both individuals. This highlights the glitter of the ring as well as emphasizing the strength of the commitment.

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The Surprise Engagement

is the Best Engagement

Present the Diamond Ring

at it’s Most Beautiful

Diamond Imports

Kiss Her With A Diamond

March 28, 2008
Industry Analysis: Consumers Losing Confidence, But Still Spending

Tiffany & Co.’s fourth-quarter results offer an interesting perspective on the current economy. The 1% drop in same-store U.S. sales for the quarter ending Jan. 31 shows that consumer spending has slowed, but hardly dried up.

The Tiffany statement reported a higher per-transaction average, suggesting that top-end diamond and designer jewelry pieces held up well. Net sales in the U.S. grew 4% to $527.9 million. International retail sales rose 21% to $422.56 million in the quarter, boosted by a 40% rise in the Asia-Pacific region, excluding Japan, and 29% in Europe.

For the fiscal year ending Jan. 31, 2008, Tiffany’s net sales grew 14.7% to $2.93 billion, while comparable-store sales increased 8% over the previous year.

The chief challenge faced by Tiffany and retail jewelers around the world is not slowing economies, but how to deal with the lofty prices of precious metals. Retailers who attempt to fully pass on the increases risk deterring consumers who might balk at the price tag or delay purchases in the expectation that prices will drop.

Some retailers have announced price increases — one reason analysts gave for disappointing Valentine’s Day sales — but few of those increases reflected the full extent of higher metal costs.

AUCTIONS: As prices for top gems soar, the major auction houses are making sure there are plenty of items to tempt the ultra-wealthy.

Christie’s is offering a 14.23-ct. rectangle-cut Fancy Intense pink diamond at its April 16 New York auction. The low estimate is $10 million, the high $15 million. The stone is owned by an unnamed jewelry collector who is also selling a diamond necklace that belonged to French Empress Eugénie in the 1850s (estimated at $4-$6 million) and many top Belle Époque, Art Nouveau and Art Deco designer pieces.

Christie’s is also offering a 39.34-ct. D-IF cushion-cut type IIa diamond it compares to the similarly shaped Polar Star diamond, a Golconda stone owned by European royalty. (“Golconda” is the term applied to type IIa diamonds mined in India — primarily the Golconda mine — during the Mogul era.)

Christie’s has several other million-dollar-plus diamonds up for bid at the New York auction, including a 29.91-ct. D-VVS1 cushion cut, and a number of fine emeralds and sapphires. There are far fewer major rubies in this sale than the previous one, with the exception of a 9.71-ct. stone identified as an unheated Burmese, carrying a top estimate of $500,000.

Christie’s and Sotheby’s have also packed extremely important diamonds and colored gems into their spring Hong Kong and Geneva sales, convinced the money is still there for such pieces.

TRADE: India’s government and diamond industry have been waging diplomatic offensives with resource-rich nations in Africa.

India’s Gem and Jewellery Export Promotion Council, accompanied by the country’s minister of commerce, is visiting Namibia and Angola this week to discuss “beneficiation” and rough supplies. These diamond-producing countries have been actively pursuing an expansion of cutting operations within their own borders, which India regards as threatening to its 900,000 to 1 million member diamond workforce — particularly because the polishing operations will likely focus on the larger, more easily worked goods that bring the most profit.

Minister of Commerce Jairam Ramesh said India must assist African nations’ efforts to “move up the value chain.” He emphasized that in the future India will find it difficult to source rough diamonds unless it demonstrates to African nations that it will collaborate actively in value addition within these producing countries.

Several key colored-gem producers also made a strong pitch to India’s mining industry at a major Indo-African conference recently. Representatives of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Mozambique and Zambia noted that India’s mining companies were welcome to compete for “sensible” exploitation of their resources.

Mining was a key topic at the India-Africa Business Conclave, held March 19-21 in New Delhi. The conference, involving 20 African nations, was a precursor to the Indo-African summit conference to be held April 8.

MACRO: Consumer confidence took another sharp decline in March, according to the Conference Board Consumer Research Center. The Confidence Index stands at 64.5, down from 76.4 in February, and the Expectations Index declined to 47.9 from 58.0. The Present Situation Index sank to 89.2 from 104.0 in February.

“Consumers’ confidence in the state of the economy continues to fade and the Index remains at a five-year low,” said Lynn Franco, director of the Research Center. “The decline in the Present Situation Index implies that the pace of growth in recent months has weakened even further. Looking ahead, consumers’ outlook for business conditions, the job market and their income prospects is quite pessimistic and suggests further weakening may be on the horizon. The Expectations Index, in fact, is now at a 35-year low, a level not seen since the Oil Embargo and Watergate.”

Slowing retail sales are also taking a toll on U.S. shopping malls. The International Council of Shopping Centers predicts that 5,770 mall stores will close this year, the highest number in four years. Russell Shor Senior Industry Analyst

***

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High Flying Diamond Intrigue : Jewellers,Auctioneers, Bankers, Lawyers, Celebrities

***

Diamond investments may turn up profits “in the rough”
Published on: Thursday, March 27, 2008 Written by: Melana Yanos

Buying diamonds as gifts and as jewelry is a common practice, but investing in diamonds is not for the average person. After all, the most economically feasible diamond investments still require access to a tremendous amount of capital and high tolerance of risk.

Diamonds have been notoriously difficult to sell on the resale market at a profit; in order to make money, diamond investors need to find a buyer who is willing to pay more for their stone than they did. Nevertheless, diamond investments are being viewed as increasingly attractive as a result of recent trends that suggest a diminishing global supply.

Multifaceted investments
Diamonds carry unique attributes that distinguish them from other types of investments. As a highly concentrated asset, diamonds are extremely portable and easy to have on one’s person at all times as jewelry or loose stones. Investing in diamonds also carries benefits of financial privacy and complete ownership.

Diamond values are not directly linked to stock and bond markets. Diamond prices have increased an average of 15 percent each year since 1949, according to statistics published by diamond manufacturer Ajediam on their company website.

[ The Diamond Guru: Not so. Prices crashed overnight in 1980 when De Beers decided to flood the market with USD$8 billion of their own reserves in order to gain control and flush out rough diamonds that were being stored by cutters. It has taken over 25 years for consumer confidence to reach today's levels. Fortunately De Beers only control 40% of today's market as opposed to nearly 80% back in 1980 ]

“Diamonds do hold their value well,” Chuck Jaffe wrote in his syndicated column last December. “So long as the stone is real, it’s not going to zero like a company headed for bankruptcy.”

International demand for diamonds appears to be on the rise, especially as an increasing number of high net worth individuals emerge in the Russian, Middle Eastern and Asian markets. The emerging middle class in China is expected to create a sharp increase in demand for diamonds and other luxury goods, according to an article in The Financial Post last June.

Extremely rare stones seem to carry the highest potential for strong performance and returns. The values of colored diamonds, for instance, have roughly doubled every six to seven years during the past 35 years, Stephen Hershoff, senior executive and managing director at Pastor-Genève, said in an e-mail interview.

Furthermore, “the colored diamond market has always been an asset class that has held its value during recessions and economic downturns,” he said.

Colored diamonds are exceptionally scarce when compared to the white variety; in terms of natural supply, the ratio of white to colored stones is approximately 10,000-to-1, according to an article posted on the Pastor-Genève website last October.

Investing in diamonds, however, is a high-risk endeavor. Regardless of the quality and appraised value of the stone, an investor’s ability to reap a profit is at the mercy of what a buyer is willing to pay.

“Diamonds are appraised and graded, but prices move based on consumer sentiment,” Jaffe wrote.

Diamonds are not especially liquid, and an investor who wishes to sell his or her diamond in order to obtain quick cash can suffer enormous losses.

“Dealers who buy jewelry don’t pay retail, and the nation’s pawn shops are full of expensive gems that were turned in for a lot less cash than they were purchased for,” Jaffe wrote.
Even colored diamonds “take some time to sell,” Hershoff said.

“There are no specific bids and offers on a daily basis,” he said. “It is more like art, coins or land in that you have to watch for similar sales to get an idea of price performance.”

If diamonds are bought at retail prices—generally two to three times more than true wholesale prices—there is “no shot” of selling them for a profit for at least a decade, Jaffe said.

[ The Diamond Guru :There are several factors contributing to low liquidity of diamonds. One of the main is the lack of terminal market. Most commodities have terminal markets, and some form of commodities exchange, clearing house, and central storage facilities. This does not exist for diamonds. Diamonds are also subject to value added tax in the Unites Kingdom, Europe, Goods & Services Tax in Australia and sales tax in most developed countries, therefore reducing their effectiveness as an investment medium. Most diamonds are sold through retail stores at very high profit margins. This is due to high overhead costs of operating a jewelry retail store ]

And as a highly concentrated and portable asset, diamonds can be easily lost or stolen without proper security measures.

Recent history serves as a cautionary tale about the potential for diamond scams. In the late 1970s, a large number of fraudulent investment firms engaged in a phone campaign to sell mail-order diamonds, according to a chapter in The Diamond Invention by Edward Jay Epstein. In addition, many of the firms held diamond-investment seminars in expensive hotels and sold sealed packets of diamonds to the audience.

Although the sealed packets distributed through seminars and by mail included certificates guaranteeing the quality of the diamonds—so long as the packets remained sealed—buyers were in for an unpleasant surprise.

“Customers who broke the seal [in order to verify the quality of the diamonds] often learned from independent appraisers that their diamonds were of a quality inferior to that stated,” Epstein wrote. “Many were worthless.”

In general, investors who know little about diamonds and how to buy them can be especially ripe targets for unscrupulous dealers.

Mining the diamond market
Diamond investments are often met with pessimism and, at times, downright condescension. Jaffe, for instance, wrote about diamonds in his syndicated column, titled Stupid Investment of the Week, last December. Diamonds may provide a terrific return as an “investment in emotion,” but “try to cash in a diamond for a profit and you have all sorts of trouble,” he wrote.

But is investing in diamonds as imprudent as it sounds? Counter to what the skeptics might expect, institutional investors are beginning to enter the diamond investment market. Swiss firm Diapason Commodities has been raising money for the launch of its Diamond Circle Capital product, according to an article published in Investment Adviser last June.

The fund will only buy polished diamonds worth more than £506,000, or approximately $1 million. The product will be the first London Stock Exchange listed fund to invest in diamonds and trade them on the secondary market.

The state of the diamond market is even more compelling.

“Diamond supply is declining for the first time in 30 years and it is primarily happening in areas where they find rare colored diamonds,” Hershoff said.

The leading mine in Australia, which produces 90 percent of the world’s pink diamonds, saw a drop of 30 percent last year in supply, he said. An additional decline of 20 to 30 percent is expected for this year.

“Pink diamonds are becoming more and more difficult to source, which is putting tremendous upward pressure on prices,” he said.

In addition, the balance of supply and demand for diamonds—and consequently, their pricing—is no longer artificially controlled by the DeBeers company, which historically owned more than 80 percent of the market.

“DeBeers is no longer the controlling factor that it once was 30 years ago,” Hershoff said. “[Their] market share has dropped to just over 40 percent of world supply; they have sold off their stockpile, and missed out on new discoveries in Canada, Australia, Russia and Central Africa.”

How to invest in diamonds
Diamond investments are probably not suitable for most investors because of the amount of capital required.

[ The Diamond Guru : Diamonds are a problematic investment. While it is easy to buy a diamond, it is not easy to sell one unless one is already an established diamond merchant. Establishing a trusted relationship with a diamond merchant similar to a stockbroker involves more than purchasing diamonds. One needs to understand diamonds. Just like not all stockbrokers are experts in their fields likewise there are a lot of diamond merchants too whose expertise is very questionable.

However we disagree with the author on the amount of capital required to invest. Real Estate property investments tend to cost a lot more than diamond " investments " ] .

“The new breed [of diamond investors] are probably already millionaires and—unlike the majority of normal investors—able to shoulder losing up to £50,000, the minimum you would spend on investment diamonds,” according to the article posted on the Pastor-Genève website last October

There are ways to mitigate the risk of enormous losses, though. If investors decide to buy, they should follow two basic rules: first, they should buy diamonds at wholesale or near-wholesale prices; and second, they should only buy diamonds that have been internationally certified by one of the major gemological laboratories, such as the Gemological Institute of America (GIA).

[ The Diamond Guru : In light of the GIA bribery scandal ," Certifigate ", and our strong support of Chaim Even-Zohar's revelations,Diamond Imports refuse to stock ANY NEW GIA graded diamonds offered to us both for ethical reasons and in our opinion many inaccurate diamond colour and clarity grades.

Likewise anyone dealing in GIA graded diamonds is NOT someone we wish to deal with until GIA’s Gem Trade Laboratory decides to disclose the bribers' names and comes clean in order to inadvertently avoid dealing with a GIA briber.

Diamond vendors can not be absolved of any wrong doing hiding behind a diamond grading report recognised or unrecognised.

Diamond Imports have both a moral and ethical duty of care to their clients

GIA is NOT an IDC diamond grading laboratory.Their colour grading standards are simply not as strict and Diamond Imports is not prepared to jeopardise their reputation unlike other diamond vendors who sell any diamond just for the sake of closing a sale.

There are numerous diamond grading laboratories, and there is no easy way for investors, consumers, or even dealers to know the relative competence and integrity of each. Even the market-leading Gemological Institute of America (GIA) suffered embarrassment recently when a small number of large, important and valuable diamonds were overgraded, resulting in legal action by one dealer against the dealer who had submitted them to the GIA for grading.This scandal has become known as Certifigate.

A number of GIA employees left after the scandal emerged, and the GIA has changed a number of its procedures.

There are also a number of laboratories affiliated to CIBJO. There must be commercial pressure on all labs to upgrade marginal stones or lose business to other labs who are prepared to reduce standards.

Investors should try to obtain stones that are as rare as possible, such as stones of the colored varieties. By virtue of their rarity, colored stones are comparatively easy to pass on and are “consequently popular investments,” according to the Pastor-Genève website.

It is important that colored diamonds are natural stones as opposed to synthetic creations, according to Hershoff. Synthetic colored diamonds are much more abundant and priced much lower than their authentic counterparts.

Investors should also be wary of buying uncut stones, which can be “extremely risky,” Hershoff said.

“The difference in value between the colored diamond grades once the stone is cut and polished can mean tens and even hundreds of thousands of dollars per carat,” he said.

[ The Diamond Guru: Polished and rough diamonds lack some of the desirable attributes of investment vehicles, including liquidity, homogeneity and fungibility.

Fungibility does not imply liquidity, and liquidity does not imply fungibility. Diamonds can be bought and sold (the trade is liquid), but individual diamonds are not interchangeable (diamonds are not fungible). Zimbabwean dollar bank notes are interchangeable in London (they are fungible there), but they are not easily traded there (they are not liquid in London).

However Round Brilliant Diamonds in D Colour and either IF or VVS1 Clarity in Excellent Proportions, Excellent Polish and Excellent Symmetry are considered fungibile amongst the Chinese community. The problem here lies that one must always verify the diamond, it's grading and the grading report are genuine if these diamonds are acceptable as hard currency.]

Because sales are largely unregulated, finding a “reputable diamond broker” is key,” according to the Pastor-Genève website. Performing due diligence on potential brokers can help protect an investor from abuse by unscrupulous individuals.

As is the case for any type of investment, investors should educate themselves as much as possible about diamonds and what factors could potentially affect their values.
When speculated properly, diamonds may prove to yield decent performance as medium- or long-term investments. However, a successful diamond investment will probably require the ultimate luxury: time.

“Most investors look at holding periods of at least five years,” Hershoff said. “When they do look to sell they allow a few months to broker the stone, whether at auction, at the dealer level, through trade shows or to retail buyers.”

Retail diamond prices are continuing to trend upwards but profitable margins on resale remain largely unproven. Still, if demand outstrips supply as industry experts predict, then diamonds present an enticing—though risky—opportunity for investment.

[ The Diamond Guru : The main positive investment parameter of diamonds is their high value per unit weight, which makes them easy to store and transport. A high quality diamond weighing as little as 2 or 3 grams could be worth as much as 100 kilos of gold. This extremely condensed value and portability does bestow diamonds as a form of emergency disaster fund. People and populations displaced by war or extreme upheaval have utilised this property successfully, and presumably will do so again in the future.]

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Feb. 1, 2008 Industry Analysis: The Economy May Slow, but Diamond Cutters Won’t

As economists debate the likelihood of a U.S. recession, diamond manufacturers in India, Israel and New York say they plan to sell to emerging markets rather than slow their production of polished stones.

Manufacturers continue to be more concerned about future supplies — largely because of rough being redirected to African diamond operations and changes in the De Beers Diamond Trading Company (DTC) sightholder list — than they are about the prospect of diminished demand in the U.S., even though it accounts for about 48% of world diamond sales.”We anticipated the slowdown since last summer and have been sending our production to the fast-growing markets of the Far East and the domestic [Indian] retailers,” said one major Indian manufacturer.

China, India and the Middle East have seen double-digit growth during the past five years. They still represent a relatively small portion of world demand, however, leaving some executives concerned about accumulating inventory and increasing debt.

Those diamond manufacturers who have scaled back their polishing operations because of the economy acknowledged that other, competing manufacturers will certainly purchase the rough they don’t use, so it is unlikely there will be any decrease in polished diamond supplies this year.

This is supported by the fact that southern African “beneficiation” diamond cutting operations will undoubtedly continue to grow and, given the enormous political pressure for their success, will not be subject to supply cutbacks.

Despite slower-than-expected U.S. holiday sales, the DTC released large allocations of rough and raised prices an average of 3.5% at the Jan. 14-18 sight. Contrary to initial reports, the sight — which totaled nearly $600 million — included increases across the board, not just on the large, high-quality material.

Diamond manufacturers see this as a clear sign that the DTC has truly abandoned its longtime “custodianship” of the diamond market, withholding supplies and stabilizing prices when the market turned soft.While most U.S. retailers will turn in positive numbers for 2007, because the slowdown did not begin in earnest until September, economists warn that 2008 may bring sales declines.

This will force some retailers to retrench and lead to consolidation within the wholesale and manufacturing sectors of the industry.Indeed, that was the mood in Japan, the world’s second largest consumer diamond market.

Dealers there are very pessimistic about their prospects for 2008, according to a Jewellery News Asia (JNA) survey. Diamond dealers who responded to JNA’s spot survey said they believe sales will decline around 5%-15% or, at best, see a single-digit increase this year against a very lackluster 2007.

RETAIL: Demand for larger diamonds and top colored stones was the one bright spot for U.S. retail jewelers in 2007, but according to a just-released luxury market survey, that spot may be dimming as well.

According to a survey conducted by Unity Marketing, luxury consumer confidence for the final quarter of 2007 plunged to its lowest level since the survey began four years ago, as wealthy consumers adopted an increasingly pessimistic view of the U.S. economy. The report noted that spending among this group fell 20% during the holiday season and will continue to be soft as an increasing number of respondents claimed they would continue to cut back during 2008.

Confidence among general consumers declined in January, according to the Conference Board’s monthly survey. January’s Consumer Confidence Index fell to 87.9 from 90.6 in December, suggesting that consumers may continue to restrain their spending.

The Board found strong pessimism about the direction of the economy over the coming six months, particularly business conditions and employment prospects.MACRO: The world stock markets continued their volatility, while gold and platinum soared to all-time records in the wake of economic uncertainty.

This week opened with gold spotting at $927.50 per ounce, while platinum’s per-ounce price broke the $1,700 barrier.The U.S. Federal Reserve, which last week issued its steepest interest rate cut in more than two decades (0.75%), added another half percent drop at this week’s meeting, hinting at even further cuts if the economy fails to respond.

The downturn in the U.S. housing market and the related subprime mortgage meltdown are taking most of the blame for the current turmoil. Sales of new homes fell last year by 26%, the steepest drop since records began in 1963, the U.S. Commerce Department said on Monday.

In December, the median price of a new home was down 10.9% from December of the previous year.One bright spot appeared this week as the U.S. Commerce Department reported that demand for big-ticket durable goods rose 5.2% in December, more than a percentage point above what economists had predicted, prompting some to say that the economy has more underlying strength than many analysts believe.

The U.S. Congress is considering an economic stimulus package to jump-start consumer spending. Economists remain divided over whether or not the legislative package or the Federal Reserve rate cuts will have any real effect on improving the economy. Source: Russell ShorSenior Industry Analyst

***

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Diamonds are Primarily a Consumer Item

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The standard number of facets of a Trilliant cut gemstone is 43.

Trilliant cut gemstones are based on a triangular shape.

Usually with truncated corners and displaying a variety of facet designs, this cut creates a spectacular wedge of brilliant fire.

The tips and culets of Trilliants are pointed and thin.

Some jewelers only bezel-set Trilliants, though prongs that protect the tips work well and show more of the gem.

As you look down through the gem, the culet generally appears centered in the middle of the table showing the pavilion of the gem with an attention to symmetry.

When you examine the gem in profile, the girdle and table facet are generally parallel.

The pavilion’s main facet usually extends from the culet perpendicularly until it intersects the girdle.

Because of their equilateral form, Trilliants return lots of light and color.

They are considered nearly as brilliant as Round cuts, so they are a great choice for customers who like brilliance but want something other than round.

Variations include rounded-corner triangles, modified shield cuts and triangular step cuts.

There should be as few polishing marks as possible and the surface should appear glossy and reflective.

Good polishing helps maximize brilliance and scintillation in Trilliants.

Trilliants work well with light-colored gems such as Diamonds where cutters try to maximize brilliance.

First developed in Amsterdam, the exact design can vary depending on a particular gem’s natural characteristics and the cutter’s personal preferences.

It may be a traditional triangular shape with pointed corners or a more rounded triangular shape with 25 facets on the crown, 19 facets on the pavilion and a polished girdle.

Some twinned (a crystal growing within a crystal) Diamond rough is naturally triangular (called “Macle”) and is ideal for Trilliants.

Diamond Imports has a magnificent Triangular Step Cut 3.14 carat H SI2 Very Good Finish for sale – DCLA Laser Inscribed #158136.

Additional reading : The Mystical Trilliant Cut Diamond

***

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Now visiting superstar Celine Dion is also proving to be the queen of generosity, according to one of the dancers performing in her Taking Chances world tour.

Celine and her entourage arrived in Brisbane over the weekend in preparation for her first Australian show – at the Entertainment Centre on Wednesday night – and touched down after a gruelling 17-show run throughout South Africa, Dubai, China and Korea.

Though normally accustomed to five-star accommodation, a promoter error saw the show’s dancers put up in some less-than-stellar lodgings on a handful of occasions leading up to their arrival in Brisbane.

To make it up to her devoted staff, Celine handed them all a small parcel recently to thank them for their patience.

And what was inside? Each dancer opened a box to find a large, gleaming two-carat diamond.

“It’s huge. I’ve got no idea what to do with mine,” one dancer told Qconfidential.

“But it’s beautiful. She is so lovely to work for. All the dancers love her, she’s amazing.”

And the gift has a pretty amazing price tag. A jewellery expert tells us a diamond of that quality could fetch anything from $10,000 to $200,000. Not that it would make much of a dent in Celine’s earnings.

The French-Canadian songbird, who holds world records in album and ticket sales, raked in just over $250 million from the three-year run of her A New Day show in Las Vegas. Source

***

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U.S. GOVERNMENT VIEWS ON LAUNDERING IN THE DIAMOND INDUSTRY

Once a year, the U.S. Department of State presents the U.S. Congress with an almost 1,000-page report on the state-of-the-world from a narcotics trade and money laundering perspective. Ostensibly there is little or no reason for diamonds to become an issue in this report, but in the just-released 2008 edition, one gets the impression that things aren’t well in the diamond world.

There are quite a few findings on which one might challenge their accuracy, but that may be a futile exercise. What is important is that the diamond industry should take note of the concerns identified by U.S. government, as the report generally serves as a basis for decisions on strategies and policies. What it is really troubling is that the report raises doubts about the effectiveness of the Kimberley Process. It is also (too) quick to put the “conflict diamonds” label on diamonds in places such as Belgium, Dubai and elsewhere.

The annual report on Money Laundering and Financial Crimes is a legislatively mandated section of the U.S. Department of State’s annual International Narcotics Control Strategy Report (INCSR). It represents an enormous effort and is based upon the contributions of numerous U.S. Government agencies and international sources. However, the principal contributor is the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), which has also issued the Jewelry Rule, requiring the U.S. diamond and jewelry business to adopt AML/CFT compliance programs.

Indeed, FinCEN has been identified as “the primary contributor to the individual country reports.” That makes the U.S. views on the international diamond industry even more captivating – as they reflect the position of the very agency that regulates the U.S. diamond industry’s anti-money laundering efforts. So it is more than just another (major) government report – it clearly reflects the perceptions of FinCEN on the state of money laundering in the international diamond business.

It is important, however, not to lose perspective. As the industry is always concerned about consumer confidence, ethics and best practice principles, we are occasionally overlooking the fact that whatever infringements may take place in our business, they are virtually peanuts when seen in an overall context. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) estimates the magnitude of money laundering to account for about three to five percent of the world’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Using 2007 World Bank data, global GDP is approximately $72.3 trillion. In other words, international money laundering can be estimated at between approximately $2.17 and $3.61 trillion a year, which is larger than the current U.S. budget. (Ten years ago, the generally accepted estimate of international money laundering was in the range of $300-$500 billion.)

But precisely because our industry’s possible infringements are so infinitely small in the overall context, we need to be concerned – and certainly not ignore – the significance FinCEN, other US governmental agencies, and the U.S. Department of States give to what is taking place in the diamond industry. The law that mandates the compiling of the annual report does not require a report on the United States, itself. If it would have, the GIA Certifigate scandal would certainly have been included in any reference to the diamond industry.

The report puts major diamond trading countries, such as India, Israel, the United States, the United Kingdom, South Africa, Switzerland, Russia, UAE, Hong Kong and the Netherlands, on the list of some 50 “major money laundering countries in 2008.” Belgium does not appear on that list. Let’s review some of the relevant country observations.

Country Observations

When discussing Angola, the report identifies “the laundering of funds derived from continuous and widespread high-level corruption as a concern, as is the use of diamonds as a vehicle for money laundering. Angola has implemented a diamond control system in accordance with the Kimberley Process. However, through the method of ‘mixing parcels’ of licit and illicit diamonds and the fraudulent purchasing of Kimberley Process ‘certificates of authenticity,’ the Kimberley Process can be compromised. Corruption and Angola’s long and porous borders further facilitate smuggling and the laundering of diamonds.”

The U.S. report is quite positive on Belgium, after it first dubiously concludes that “m ost of the ‘blood’ or ‘conflict diamonds’ from long-running African civil wars were processed in Antwerp. Authorities have transmitted a number of cases relating to diamonds to the public prosecutor, and that office is examining the sector closely in cooperation with local police and diamond industry officials.”

While complimenting the Kimberley certification process for “introducing much-needed transparency into the global diamond trade,” the report then concludes in the same sentence that “diamonds of questionable origin continue to appear on the Belgian market.” It then simply charges that “the Government of Belgium (GOB) recognizes the particular importance of the diamond industry, as well as the potential vulnerabilities it presents to the financial sector.” I really wonder who in the Belgian government would have conveyed such view to the U.S. State Department.

The report isn’t generous to India either. “India’s emerging status as a regional financial center, its large system of informal cross-border money flows, and its widely perceived tax avoidance problems all contribute to the country’s vulnerability to money laundering activities. Some common sources of illegal proceeds in India are narcotics trafficking, illegal trade in endangered wildlife, trade in illegal gems (particularly diamonds), smuggling, trafficking in persons, corruption, and income tax evasion.” I fail to understand how diamonds can be viewed as an “illegal gem” in India, and I hope that industry leaders will not fail to press for some explanation.

From the significant diamond countries, South Africa gets, perhaps, the worst criticism as being a center of “international crime groups,” which, naturally, are involved in “illegal dealings and theft of precious metals and diamonds” and a host of other criminal activity.

What troubles me is the apparent lack of evidence and absence of any sense of “proportionality” in the report’s frequent mentioning of diamonds. It reminds me of the rumors about a diamond connection to al-Qaeda and how they helped the Clean Diamonds Act to pass quickly through the U.S. Congress – even though FBI, CIA and other US government reports (including the 9/11 Commission Report) later conceded that there had never been an iota of evidence to such link beyond one journalist’s report.

The U.S. government report doesn’t mince words about the Dubai diamond business. “Dubai remains the center of the UAE’s burgeoning diamond trade, although new facilities are springing up in the Emirates of Ajman and Ras Al Khaimah as interest spreads in the lucrative business.” After discussing the quite elaborate legal frameworks, the report zooms in on a single smuggling transaction that was caught in 2006, when “Russian customs officials reportedly apprehended an air passenger from Dubai after he tried to smuggle 2.5 kilos of diamonds into the country. There are also reports that diamonds are increasingly being used as a medium to provide counter valuation in ‘hawala’ (informal remittances) transfers, particularly between Dubai and Mumbai.”

The alleged premature release of two questionable parcels is then cited to “ indicate continuing weaknesses in the [Kimberley] process.” A World Diamond Council report (?) was said to quote a local company that “stated that they had in their possession large quantities of African diamonds without Kimberley Process certification.” I find that hard to swallow.

Israel ’s diamond industry fared well in the report. It cited the first reading in the Knesset (Parliament) of a bill that imposes anti-money laundering rules on the diamond sector. The report also states that Israel’s “ Customs Authority continues to intercept unreported diamond shipments, despite the fact that Israel imposes no tariffs on diamond imports.”

Focusing on Lebanese Traders in Africa

The considerable attention the report is giving to diamonds in Lebanon might make one conclude that it is a major diamond trading center. It is not. The U.S. government recalls old information on diamond smuggling from the Congo, simply concluding that it has “serious doubts on Lebanon’s commitment to counter the trade in conflict diamonds.” It then cites the “consistent reports that many Lebanese diamond brokers in Africa are engaged in the laundering of diamonds—the most condensed form of physical wealth in the world.”

While describing the apparent, effective Kimberley Process operations at Beirut International Airport, the report nevertheless laments that all these “safeguards do not address the issue of smuggled diamonds, the purchase of fraudulently obtained Kimberley Process certificates, the laundering of diamonds, or value transfer via the diamond trade.”

“Lebanon has a large expatriate community throughout the Middle East, Africa, and parts of Latin America. They often work as brokers and traders. Many Lebanese ‘import-export’ concerns are found in free trade zones. Many of these Lebanese brokers network via family ties and are involved with underground finance and trade-based money laundering. Informal remittances and value transfer in the form of trade goods add substantially to the remittance flows from expatriates via official banking,” says the report to Congress.

“Expatriate Lebanese brokers are actively involved in the smuggling and laundering of diamonds in Africa. There are also reports that many in the Lebanese expatriate business community willingly or unwillingly give ‘charitable donations’ to representatives of Hezbollah (which is based in Lebanon). The funds are then repatriated or laundered back to Lebanon.”

Deterrence and Convictions are the Objectives

It isn’t so simple to place all these “findings” about diamonds in a proper perspective. It is clear that there is no other commodity in the world that has voluntarily embraced such a high level of monitoring of the flows of goods and moneys, or has adopted voluntary warranties along the value chain, while the governments in the countries where we operate have legislated dedicated diamond industry anti-money laundering regulations.

There are many factors that are simply beyond the controls of the diamond industry players, especially in Africa. The report signals that there are jurisdictions which are having trouble converting their anti-money laundering policies and programs into investigations, prosecutions, and convictions. “In some cases”, says the report, “the lack of enforcement is due to lack of capacity, but in far too many others it is due to a lack of political will.”

Virtually all diamond dealers in the United States and in the main trading partner countries have some kind of AML/CFT program, do client and supplier due diligence, report suspicious transactions – but, sometimes, this all seems frustratingly irrelevant in the total scheme of things. One of the concerns expressed in the report is that too many jurisdictions are getting caught up in the AML/CTF process and losing sight of the objective.

Financial intelligence is simply the process; the means to an end. Rather, says the report, “the objective continues to be anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism finance convictions. Convictions, combined with asset seizure and forfeiture are the true deterrents, the most meaningful ‘measurable,’ and the bottom line. Far too many jurisdictions continue to fall short in this regard.” This is so true.

With all the criticism and concerns about the diamond industry, one cannot escape the conclusion that the international diamond industry is doing its part. How can we impact the policies of governments such as DRC, Angola, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Russia and other relevant countries? The party that seems to be miserably failing is government, which is the only authority that can deliver indictments, convictions, asset seizures, etc. – but not just overseas.

Let’s look at the United States, the “author” of the report and leader in spearheading the international war against money laundering. As we have noted in last week’s column, New York diamond industry leaders are literally pleading and lobbying government to investigate and bring to justice those involved in one of the industry’s most serious bribing and laundering scandals. When you actually think about this, it is both strange and sad. But it is the way it is. Source: 27th March 2008 Chaim Even-Zohar

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Exclusive creation showcased at NY auto show

NEW YORK—The New York International Auto Show at the Jacob Javits Center features a stunning Rolls-Royce motorcar mascot designed by a Manhattan-based jeweler.
The mascot, known as the Spirit of Ecstasy, sits on every Rolls-Royce coming out of the factory. A one-of-a-kind mascot was commissioned by local luxury car dealership Manhattan Motorcars. Designer Jean Kemanjian described his creation, valued at $200,000, and the design process.
Four inches high by two inches across, the mascot is original to the car. “What inspired me was using the materials we used—the diamonds, platinum, and rare metals. We felt that doing something like this would be a tribute to the car itself.”
Diamonds clearly define the work. “It wasn’t too hard to come up with an idea to add diamonds to a vehicle,” said Kemanjian. “That’s never been done before.” On such a delicate piece, jewels glow from every fold and indentation. “What we did was to add 150 carats of D color VVS1 quality diamonds and some fancy intense yellow diamonds on the wings.”
The skill of the jeweler comes into play at the base. According to Kemanjian, “Pave (pah-vay) is a technique that we use to actually create the surface, which is actually a diamond surface. What you’re looking at is actually diamond after diamond. It’s like laying down tiles. It’s the most expensive surface you can create known to man.”
Based on a sculpture of a woman in fluttering robes by Charles Robinson Sykes, the mascot has adorned the hoods of Rolls-Royce motorcars since 1911. The mascot is commonly known as “Silver Lady” or “Flying Lady.” (The figure is an interpretation of the 3rd-century B.C. Greek sculpture, the Nike of Samothrace, a Greek symbol of victory.)
Kemanjian stated his diamond-studded mascot is exclusive to Manhattan Motorcars. “This is what Rolls-Royce base their whole emblem on. This goes on every car but without the diamonds. This is the only one in existence,”
Although he designed the prototype for the New York dealership, he is quick to point out that the car itself is all Rolls. “The whole car is original, from top to bottom. This is the original mascot that comes with the car. There’s no after market, there’s nothing added to the car. This is all original Rolls-Royce.”
Kemanjian indicated that everything is done by hand—the polishing, placement—and the designer says these diamonds are really forever. “Diamonds are the hardest surface in the world. They’ll never scratch, they’ll never rust. This will stay like this for eternity.”

Source

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