Accra, Jan. 05, GNA - Government on Friday said come early March 2007 it would pass all the requirements of the Kimberley Process to clean the name of Ghana in the illegal trade in diamonds coming from conflict regions.
Professor Dominic Fobih, Minister of Lands Forestry and Mines, said Ghana was committed to the Action Plan developed at Gaborone, Botswana that would assist the country to deal with conflict diamonds issues. "The Action Plan is so critical to Ghana since it presents another opportunity for us to clean our image," he said.
The Minister was speaking in Accra when the Acting Head of the European Commission in Ghana, Mr Paulus Geraedts led a team that arrived in the country to provide Ghana with technical support towards implementing the Kimberly Process (KP).
The EC, which took over the Chairmanship of KP on January 1, 2007, is providing the assistance through South African Experts to help Ghana to strengthen its regulatory, monitoring and supervision mechanisms for the KP.
Prof. Fobih announced that the US would also be supporting the country in the process but was quick to add that in all these, "Ghana must be seen to be championing the process itself".
He said currently the Government had put in place a general supervisory body Chaired by a Deputy Minister of Mines to give the entire process a ministerial prominence.
He said the Precious Mineral Marketing Company was also being empowered to tighten its monitoring and supervision mechanisms. Mr Geraedts lauded the KP and said it was successful in curbing illegal trade of conflict diamonds and proved to be an effective and innovative instrument of international cooperation involving multilateral corporations, governments, nongovernmental organisations and the diamond industry.
He said having assumed the Chairmanship; the EC's overall objective would be to promote continuity through consolidation by strengthening the KP.
Mr Geraedts said the EC would do so by pursuing and strengthening implementation of the peer review system; research the traceability of diamonds; increase transparency and accuracy of statistics; promote inclusiveness and participation; improve Information and Communication and improve national implementation capacity of KP participants.
Mr Abbey Chikane, Chairman of the South African Diamond Board, who was part of the team, said Ghana could meet all the requirements but noted that the country was yet to quantify the exact volumes of diamonds produced at the various mines.
"By the end February 2007 we are optimistic that Ghana will be ready to receive a special mission from the EC KP for assessment of its implementation.
"The more countries that are involved in the process, the more we do away with more countries that serve as safe places for illegal trade in conflict diamonds," Mr Chikane said. 5 Dec. 06
