Myanmar: New Documentary Sheds Light on Link between Gems and War in Myanmar

May 15, 2017 | Euan Black, Globe
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Produced by the UK-based NGO Global Witness, ‘Jade and the Generals’ follows the group’s undercover investigation in 2015, which revealed the gem trade to be worth up to $31 billion in 2014 alone, equal to 48% of Myanmar’s official GDP at the time. The country’s rich natural resources fell prey to the country’s corrupt military, which, in the 1990s, consolidated the mining industry into the hands of a few well-connected elites.