DiCaprio: Bloody

New York, Sept. 7 (Reuters): A global diamond trade organisation embarked yesterday on a campaign to counteract any negative publicity stemming from a new Hollywood movie and a rap song about conflict or blood diamonds.

The print and online campaign by the World Diamond Council was sparked by jewellers’ fears of sales being hit by the upcoming film The Blood Diamond, starring Leonardo Dicaprio, about a South African mercenary jailed for smuggling in Sierra Leone, ravaged during a civil war that killed 50,000 people.

The Warner Brothers movie, due for release later this year, follows a Grammy-winning song by rapper Kanye West, Diamonds from Sierra Leone, with a video clip featuring blood running down a girl’s hand as she slips on a diamond ring. Blood or conflict diamonds are those illegally traded to fund conflict in war-torn areas, particularly in central and western Africa, and often linked to human rights abuses.

Eli Izhakoff, president of the New York-based World Diamond Council, which represents over 50 industry organisations, said the diamond industry wanted to get the message across that it had addressed and continues to address the issue.

He said the movie was based in the late 1990s when blood diamonds accounted for about four per cent of global diamond sales but the situation had changed since a system of certification, the Kimberley Process, was instituted in 2000 and these diamonds now make up less than one per cent.

“We were concerned that the movie be told in the historical perspective, that these things are something that happened in the past and since then, the industry, governments and NGOs have taken care to take care of this problem,” Izhakoff said.

The World Diamond Council has launched a new website, www.diamondfacts.org, aimed at educating the public about the gems.