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"BLOOD DIAMOND" CONFERENCES POINT WAY TO AFRICAN-OWNED INDUSTRY "Africans should cut, polish and market their own diamonds. Then they wouldn't have to rely on non-African intervention," says McKinney
August 4, 2000
Washington - Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney (D-GA) a member of the International Relations Committee and Ranking Member of the International Operations and Human Rights Subcommittee expressed concern today over the continued pillage of the resources of the African Continent. She asserted that international conferences on "Blood Diamonds" should include as part of their recommendations, that the cutting, polishing and marketing of diamonds should be done by the African nations themselves. Since colonial times, European interests have raped and plundered the natural resources of Africa while indigenous people receive little or no benefit. Even now, the mining and processing of diamonds is largely controlled by non indigenous interests and has even financed bloody wars in Angola, Sierra Leone and The Democratic Republic of Congo. It's the behavior of non indigenous interests coupled with nefarious African interests that has financed these bloody wars, kept people in extreme poverty and has claimed millions of lives throughout the Continent. While international elites talk, innocent Africans continue to die and the oil and diamonds never stop flowing. |
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