De Beers offers to help UN

The giant diamonds firm, De Beers, says it's offered to help the United Nations in the fight against the sale of illicit diamonds.

De Beers said its experts could determine if diamonds came from countries like Angola or Sierra Leone, where the sale of gems helps fund civil wars.

The UN hasn't responded to the offer.

It comes a day after a UN report said De Beers had to accept some responsibility for the trade in what it calls blood diamonds.

A spokesman for De Beers Andy Lamont told the BBC that his company played no part in the trafficking of illegal diamonds.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service