Amazon Diamonds
Read MoreDiamonds are auctoned off at an auditorium in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Feb. 2, 2005. The diamonds, from the Roosevelt Indian Reserve in the Amazonian state of Rondonia, were the reason for a massacre of 29 illegal diamond prospectors in April 2004. Members of the Cinta Larga tribe killed the miners who entered their reserve illegally to look for the diamonds. Although mineral extraction is illegal on indian reserves, the federal government made a special auction of the diamonds, and after operational costs are paid, Indians will receive the money. A total of 716,920 Brazilian Reals (about 275,738.50 US dollars) was earned from the diamonds, about 2.18 times the minimum value. While most indians live in poverty, Brazil's Mines and Energy Ministry estimates $2 billion worth of diamonds have been taken off the 6.7 million-acre reservation since 1999 and making it South America's largest diamond mine. (AustralFoto/Douglas Engle)