Two experts to help in Kimberly process

TWO experts from South Africa are in the country to help the country to purge itself of the illegal trade in diamonds through the implementation of the Kimberly Process (KP).
The KP is an innovative instrument of international co-operation involving multi-lateral organisations, governments, non-government organisations (NGOs) and the diamond industry to take a plan of action to curb the illegal trade in conflict diamonds on the international market.
Late last year, Ghana was enlisted as a country which carried out possible illegal trade in diamonds as a result of the conflict in neighbouring Cote d’Ivoire. The country risked being banned from the international diamond trade as a result of the reports.
In an interview, Mr Paulus Geraedts, the acting Head of Delegation of the European Commission to Ghana, sponsors of the programme, said the European Union (EU) was committed to ensuring that Ghana expunged itself from the illegal diamond trade.
That, he said, was because of the high level of co-operation between the EU and Ghana this year, as a result of the Golden Jubilee celebrations of both Ghana and the EU.
Again, since the EU took the chairmanship of the KP in January this year, it was committed to ensuring that the country was probably certified after the review periods, which ended in March, he said,.
Mr Geraedts said the agenda of the EU chairmanship would be to promote “continuity through consolidation” by strengthening the KP.
That, he said, would be done by putting emphasis on pursuing and strengthening the implementation of the peer review system, research the traceability of diamonds, increase transparency and accuracy of statistics, promote inclusiveness and participation and improve information capacity in KP participants.
He said the EU would also seek to enhance the capacity to react to emerging crises with a view to ensuring that the KP would increasingly be a “process from conflict diamonds to property diamonds”.
He said during the KP Plenary meeting in Gaborone in Bowtswana in November last year, the plenary agreed on an action plan with Ghana, with a view to ensuring that it could fulfil its obligations under the KP and subject itself to a review mission after three months.
Mr Geraedts said “given the importance of the matter, the EC has agreed to assist the government of Ghana in complying with the Gaborone Action Plan for Ghana”.
The acting Head of Delegation said he was confident that the country would show its usual strong leadership and firm action commitment so that the review mission would prove the country’s full compliance with minimum KP requirements.
Two reviews on the country’s compliance with the Action Plan are expected to be held this month and February, while a final review is expected to be held in March which will either clear the country’s name in the illegal trade of diamonds or affirm its status as supporting the illegal trade.