«Neue Zürcher Zeitung»

The title of the article: “Diamond Mecca Antwerp is suffering from anti-Russian sanctions.”

The subtitle: “The merchants’ business has collapsed – now they are crying out for help from the state.”

“Initially, the European Commission did not want to impose sanctions against Russian diamonds, as this would disproportionately affect one of the EU member states, Belgium.

Nevertheless, the sanctions package dated 01.01.2024 provided for a complete ban on the import of Russian diamonds from March 2024, including those Russian stones that were processed in other countries. In short: Antwerp’s diamond industry is experiencing a “perfect storm”.”

To understand the real force of this storm and how seriously Europe is shooting itself in its own legs with a heavy machine gun, it is enough to know that 80% of the world’s uncut and 50% of processed diamonds passed through the Belgian city of Antwerp.

A third of these diamonds were Russian.

The losses are measured not only by multibillion-dollar losses for the Belgian budget, but the very existence of Antwerp as a diamond Mecca is at risk, because Russian diamonds have already found other trading platforms (Mumbai, Dubai, Hong Kong) and the global diamond business has flowed out of Antwerp like water from a leaky pan.

@psy_parafin