Squeezing Out the St. Petersburg Zimbabwe Agreement

Only a few details are available at press time, but at this point one thing is clear – a lot of pressure by the diamond industry forced a minority group of countries to accept a compromise. It should be understood that the current agreement does not give Zimbabwe carte blanche authority to export rough diamonds as it sees fit.

Zimbabwe cannot do what any other diamond producing Kimberley Process member can do – export any and all its rough diamonds as it wishes. The agreement reached at the World Diamond Council 7th Annual Meeting in St. Petersburg today (Thursday) allows for only two rough diamond exports from the Marange diamond fields in Zimbabwe. Then the African country will be reviewed again.

The two exports will include the production mined since May 28, probably in two equal value shipments. The second export, in early September, will be accompanied by a KP review mission to the country.

You may wonder, after all the deep digging in by the U.S. and NGOs, what was it that finally allowed this small allowance. First, starting at the WFDB congress in Moscow, the diamond industry decided to speak out loudly about the issue. It is no coincidence that many journalists (including myself) quoted sources saying that the overwhelming majority supports the exports. All these sources were from the industry, not KP member countries.

The U.S. showed up with a fragmented team, speaking in three different voices, one representing KP and diamonds, another commerce and the third the African Desk. All three are State Dept. people, but each with a somewhat different agenda. The African Desk, for example, wants to oust President Robert Mugabe. The alternatives – an equally greedy and bloody successor or rampant smuggling via Hezbollah supporting Lebanese traders – seemed to it less important.

The NGOs were a lot less involved this time around compared to their high profile in Tel Aviv last month.

African countries exerted a lot more pressure, underscored by a threat tossed in by Namibia that if exports are not approved, the country will leave KP. It's not clear how serious they were, but imagine the possible domino effect if that would have happened.

Finally, a number of participants pointed out the extensive behind the scenes efforts of IDMA President Moti Ganz. His cajoling played an important role in bringing about the compromise.

Finally, many were simply tired, if not fed up, and actually left St. Petersburg before the talks were concluded.

This is not the last we hear of Zimbabwe. The September review mission may find that Zimbabwe is not meeting the minimum KP standards, which will start another round of discussions.

This is not a happy end. No one is really satisfied with the agreement, and many view the outcome as the smaller failure. A good agreement, a smart woman wants told me, is the exchange of satisfaction. Each side is satisfied with what it gets. This is not the case here.

With governments as members of the KP, and the diamond industry and NGOs serving as observers, KP is falling victim to global politics. All agreed that from a KP standpoint, Zimbabwe is fully compliant.

KP is due for a serious overhaul, but most feel that it won't be enough. Frankly, the tired attitude expressed today scares me more than allowing or preventing one country's exports.