Free Republic

Setback for jewel industry is good news for high-tech Two companies are manufacturing gem-quality diamonds that may break the DeBeers cartel and set off a high-tech craze for diamond chips much heartier than silicon, reports Wired Magazine's September issue. The diamonds are flawless and can fool even the most expert of gemologists. The natural conditions that produce diamonds have long been understood – put pure carbon under enough heat and pressure and it will crystallize into the hardest material known. But evolutionists have suggested it would require millions of years to reproduce the precise set of circumstances. Some have suggested...

Issue 11.09 - September 2003The New Diamond AgeArmed with inexpensive, mass-produced gems, two startups are launching an assault on the De Beers cartel.Next up: the computing industry.By Joshua DavisAron Weingarten brings the yellow diamond up to the stainless steel jeweler's loupe he holds against his eye. We are in Antwerp, Belgium, in Weingarten's marbled and gilded living room on the edge of the city's gem district, the center of the diamond universe. Nearly 80 percent of the world's rough and polished diamonds move through the hands of Belgian gem traders like Weingarten, a dealer who wears the thick beard...

ANTWERP, Belgium, Feb. 25 (UPI) -- Belgian police have arrested four suspects in connection with last week's multimillion-dollar diamond robbery in Antwerp, the city's public prosecutor confirmed Tuesday. The alleged thieves, believed to be three Italians and one Dutch woman, will appear in court Thursday charged with masterminding the diamond capital's biggest-ever jewel heist. The news will bring some relief to Antwerp's tight-knit community of diamond cutters, buyers and sellers, who have dominated the global trade in the precious stones since the end of the 19th century. More than 80 percent of the world's diamonds pass through the prosperous Belgian...

Artisanal mining was not illegal in the DRC prior to the 1980s, but diamonds could only be sold within the mining zone, or in adjacent villages. It was illegal to sell diamonds in Kinshasa and in the main urban areas in the Kasai provinces, although this was not fully respected. Corrupt officials allowed a limited trade to exist, but government attitudes vacillated and harsh measures were taken intermittently to purge the diamond fields of prospectors, especially in areas around or within the concession of La Société Minière de Bakwanga (MIBA), the diamond mining parastatal. MIBA provided the bulk of Zaire’s...