Blood Diamonds

1868: Star of Africa found on De Beers farm.

1986: Conservation Society of Sierra Leone supports the conservation of Sierra Leone's natural resources.

1994: RUF takes over diamond mining areas in Sierra Leone. 50,000 people killed and 2.3 million displaced.

1995: Freetown liberated from RUF, most of the diamond mining areas also liberated.

1998: Global Witness Organization tries to reveal to the world the role blood diamonds played in funding civil war in Africa. The campaign was called Combating Conflict Diamonds.

1998: Human rights group Global Witness reports Angola is producing diamonds to fund war efforts against goverment.

2000: RUF kidnapped 500 UN Peacekeepers

2000: UN imposes global embargo of diamond exports out of Sierra Leone.

2000: The World Diamond Council, consisting of members of the diamond industry, get together and come up with a potential solution to the blood diamond trade. This solution is the Kimberley Process.

2000:  The Kimberley Process Certification Scheme (KSCS) is developed that requires ALL rough diamonds exported out of participating countries to be KSCS certified. This worked, until countries started having unregistered boosts in exports, that could only come from the blood diamond industry kicking up again. Because of the nature of the Kimberley Process, little could be done to stop it without getting rid of KSCS. More info on this here.

2007: UN lifted diamond embargo on Liberia's diamond trade. Liberia relaunches its diamond trade, in hopes it will no longer be violent.

2007: Portuguese court allowed publication of "Blood Diamonds: Corruption and Torture in Angola"

2009: Canadian Organization One Sky helps Sierra Leone's environment recover by replanting areas that have been mined for diamonds.

2009: Amnesty International, an organization created to stop the abuse of children, tries to stop illegal mining of blood diamonds.

2011: 4 day meeting of The Kimberley Process ends.