IVORY COAST: From the shade of a makeshift shed, Mohammed Conde watches his workers turn over the red soil with shovels and pickaxes: diamond mining at Bobi in the Ivory Coast persists despite a UN ban.

Diamond extraction is the main activity at this large village in the heart of the wooded savannah in the country’s north-west. The open-pit mine, the region’s largest, extends over a kilometre. Hundreds work here in spite of a UN embargo on Ivory Coast rough diamonds, initiated in 2005 with the argument that the trade financed New Forces (FN) rebels behind a failed 2002 coup against President Laurent Gbagbo.

“Before the embargo we extracted diamonds in 25 villages in Seguela district (420 kilometres west of Abidjan) compared to only 10 today,” said mine operator Mohammed Conde.

“Rough diamonds don’t sell so well any more, the big Israeli and South African investors have left, because of the embargo,” Conde said. “Ivorian diamonds no longer put food on the table.” Diamonds still feed around 5,000 people — compared to 20,000 before 2005 — read data from Ivorian mining development group Sodemi.

Diamond expert Michel Yobouet said the embargo covers exports not extraction.