cable- Since the Taliban came to power in 2021, high-quality Afghan emeralds have captured a large share of the domestic and international market, rivaling Colombian emeralds, and are mined in large quantities in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Zambia and Colombia.
At the beginning of the 20th century, geologists from Britain, France and the United States reported the presence of emeralds, known as the “king of green gems,” in the mountains of Panjshir province, north of the capital, Kabul. In the 1970s, Afghan and Russian geologists were able to discover emerald mines in this region.
In 1970, Soviet geologists conducted a systematic survey of gemstone resources in Afghanistan, but after the assassination of the late President Mohammad Daoud Khan in 1973, political changes hampered geological work throughout the country.
Movement intervention
After the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan in 1989, the people of Panjshir turned their attention to working and searching for emeralds in the Hindu Kush mountains, and teams of miners use explosives and excavators to remove the limestone containing emeralds.
The spokesman for the Ministry of Mines, Humayun Afghan, told Al Jazeera Net that for decades, the emerald mines in Panjshir were “in the hands of the mafia and warlords,” who extracted this precious material and then smuggled it and sold it on the black market.
He added that the Islamic Emirate (Afghanistan) decided to extract these mines legally and for the benefit of all the people of the province, and to provide job opportunities for young people by allowing them to dig in them, provided that each one obtains a mining license, and to sell them in the local market and in front of the ministry’s inspectors.
According to Humayun Afghan, after resuming mining in the emerald mines, about 60 thousand carats of it were sold, worth more than 4 million dollars, during the first 8 months of this year, and the state treasury received a 10% tax.
Before the Taliban came to power, emeralds were mined in a very primitive way, sometimes using explosives, and exported as raw material to Pakistan, India, and Thailand, and the government could not “take taxes from the warlords for the state treasury.”
For his part, Abdul Rahim Aziz, head of the Hekakin Association, said that emerald mines were discovered in Panjshir thousands of years ago. He told Al Jazeera that the province, due to civil wars, had not produced commercial quantities of it until the past two decades, with about $10 million worth of emeralds produced in 1990, “a very small percentage compared to the number of mines in Panjshir.”
prominent role
Afghan affairs experts believe that after the fall of the government of Najibullah, the last communist president, and the start of fighting between the former mujahideen, precious stones – most importantly emeralds – played a prominent role in igniting the fighting fronts. They explained that a very few families took over the emerald mines and extracted them and sold them in the French markets, while the people were not allowed to approach them.
Political analyst Hekmat Jalil explained to Al Jazeera Net that certain families were extracting emeralds in Panjshir, then smuggling them to European markets, especially French ones, or selling them on the black market. The former coalition front was benefiting from the revenues from these mines to provide weapons and pay the salaries of its fighters.
According to political analysts, during the two periods of Taliban rule, Panjshir was one of the political and military bases of the movement’s opponents. It is the only province that Taliban fighters took control of by force, and contains 1,800 emerald mines. They added that the Taliban tried – in the early days of its rule – to extract emeralds but failed, and then retracted its decision and allowed the people to mine in its mines, trying to gain the loyalty of the population in various ways.
The governor of Panjshir was appointed from its people, and a large percentage was allocated to integrate young people into the army and police. The leader of the movement, Sheikh Hibatullah Akhundzada, issued a decision allowing the people of the province to dig in emerald mines in various areas of it, under conditions determined by the Ministry of Mines.
The ministry held 24 auction sessions to sell and market the emeralds extracted in Panjshir, in addition to holding an exhibition to introduce them and other precious stones.
Transparent process
For their part, investors in the Panjshir mine say the process of offering and selling emeralds has now become “transparent” and is being exported abroad legally in the name of Afghanistan. Previously, this process was carried out on the black market, away from the eyes of the government, and was exported in the names of Afghanistan’s neighbors to European and Chinese markets. The ministry has distributed 586 licenses to operate in the mines, providing jobs for more than 15,000 residents of the province.
For his part, a jeweler and member of a gemstone association, who now lives in Britain and does not want to reveal his identity, says that in the past, mined emeralds would reach the market in Kabul, and the buying and selling would be done in secret.
He added to Al Jazeera Net that only a few merchants knew about the price of emeralds, and they did not know who sold and who bought, but the situation has changed now and things have become better, as emeralds are sold in the auction session and everyone can participate in it.
Gemstone traders say Afghanistan could be at the top of the list of countries with high-quality emeralds in the future, as it has higher transparency and quality than many countries.
The emerald mine is located in Panjshir province, about 113 kilometers north of Kabul, at an altitude of about 3,135 to 4,270 meters, and in an area estimated at 150 square miles (400 square kilometers), which is double the area known in 1985.
Panjshir emerald entered the global markets in 2017, and there is a large share in the Chinese and Hong Kong markets, and the Chinese prefer it compared to what is extracted in other countries.
Currently, Colombia, Brazil, Zambia, Zimbabwe and the United States are the world’s main emerald exporters, and Afghanistan can also be included in the same list.
