Lapis

1TV: Afghanistan aims to deprive Taliban militants of funds from smuggled exports of the prized blue gemstone, lapis lazuli, by creating its own bourse to sell the stone, which has been traded for thousands of years in the Hindu Kush mountains. The Taliban is increasingly financed by criminal enterprises such as smuggling gemstones like lapis, rubies, emeralds, as well as heroin laboratories and kidnapping. Afghanistan loses roughly $100 million a year through gemstone smuggling, more than the total exports of commodities like coal and industrial minerals like talc, said the country’s mining minister. Click here to read more (external link).