Russia Reveals Shiny State Secret: It’s Awash in Diamonds

Fred Weir
Christian Science Monitor
September 17, 2012

Russia has just declassified news that will shake world gem markets to their core: the discovery of a vast new diamond field containing “trillions of carats,” enough to supply global markets for another 3,000 years.

The Soviets discovered the bonanza back in the 1970s beneath a 35-million-year-old, 62-mile diameter asteroid crater in eastern Siberia known as Popigai Astroblem.

They decided to keep it secret, and not to exploit it, apparently because the USSR’s huge diamond operations at Mirny, in Yakutia, were already producing immense profits in what was then a tightly controlled world market.

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This article was posted: Monday, September 17, 2012 at 4:07 pm

Tags: foreign affairs, precious metals

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