RUSSIAN CONNECTION: 'MINING ON THE TUNDRA
Larisa Popugayeva and Fyodor Belikov are not household Russian names but they have a special place in diamond history. On Aug. 21, 1954, they discovered a Siberian diamond field that would make their nation one of the greatest producers of all time.

The mining area in the desolate, frozen (winter temperatures drop to -140 F) province of Western Yakutia is full of diamond riches. Once the Russians determined how to mine and live under the vile weather conditions, they quickly brought a number of major mines into production. The Mir, or Peace, became the most famous. Today Russia continues as a major producer, with much of its output made up of high-quality diamonds. The government willingly (if quietly) sends its rough diamonds into normal distribution channels. The Russians also polish some stones and these normally are sold to the international trade through the Antwerp marketplace.

OF SACRED SITES, DESERTS & SEAWALLS
Devil Devil Spring in the hot, empty Mmberley region of Western Australia is one mysterious symbol of the difficulties facing modern diamond mining. It is an aboriginal sacred site, a water hole used once a year for young people's initiation ceremonies. It's also smack on the fringe of the world's most productive diamond mine, the Argyle. Back in 1982, when large-scale development of the $400 million Argyle mine was starting in this remote northwest corner of the country, planners identified 58 such sites in the mine area. Because of the delicacy of the aboriginal issue, access to critical areas was negotiated case-by-case. Devil Devil stays off limits to the miners; Barramundi Gap, which gave a commanding view of the mountainous terrain, was absorbed into the mine.

To an outsider, most sacred sites seem unremarkable. But at one time the entire Argyle development timetable was threatened as negotiations dragged on and on. Elsewhere in today's diamond world, mining is beset with such difficulties, some of them extreme. Take Angola, for example. The graceful, sweeping waterfront vistas of Luanda, the capital of the former Portuguese colony, contrast sharply with the nation's diamond-producing, civil war- torn interior. Only recently has enough peace returned to allow serious prospecting to start again. In the global scheme, Angola is potentially one of the richer gem diamond producers of the future. Next door in Botswana, today's prime gem diamond producer, there is no war. But there are natural enemies-desert, heat and a land devoid of any industrial infrastructure. In 1967, when geologists discovered the first of Botswana's three great diamond pipes at Orapa, the country was one of the world's poorest nations, subsisting on barren land with family or tribal agriculture. To open and develop a major mine was a transportation and technological marvel but, in partnership with De Beers, Botswana has now done it three times. The chronicle is similar for most of Africa, the bountiful center of world diamond production. In Namibia a vigilantly maintained wall of sand protects an incredible seashore diamond mine from attack by the rolling, breaking seas of the South Atlantic. In Zaire, another of the world's great diamond producers, nomad tribes poach brashly in the mining areas and smuggle many thousands of carats across porous national borders.

South Africa is the granddaddy of the continent's diamond rushes. The opening of its mines, starting in the late 1860s, is the stuff of legend. Those were the rough-and-tumble days of riches and misery, glory and defeat, of the frail English adventurer Cecil Rhodes, of his political and business empire building-and of the creation of diamond's most famous name, De Beers.