Boaz Hirsch, chief of the international operations division in the Industry, Trade and Labor Ministry, was named last week to head the Kimberley Process, which combats trade in illegal "conflict" or "blood" diamonds, rough diamonds used to finance human rights abuses, including slavery and armed conflicts aimed at undermining governments. Israel took over from Namibia, which hosted the annual meeting where Hirsch was named, and is expected to hand over chairmanship to the Democratic Republic of Congo in 2011.

Since its founding in 2003, the process has managed to reduce traffic in such diamonds from 15 percent to one percent. Hirsch told Arutz Sheva's Hebrew journal that the goal is to get rid of that one percent and set up a system that prevents the phenomenon.