more about emeralds in Afghanistan as well as other minerals...

http://atwar.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/03/12/emeralds-of-afghanistan/

I think our days of more or less ignorance are over and that we have to now see the world in more x-ray vision..I now see this little web of tunnels and shafts all over the world. And when the lives of miners are improved, and we find ways to reduce our need for some stuff..like coal...which we already know how and yet selfish people protest windmills because they don't like the look of them...things will be better. And we can say, well...it is a hard world and they do have the option of leaving the mines and being terribly poor. Harsh as that is, there are worse situations and I think we need to look at places where they use essentially slaves in mines..North Korea comes to mind. mg