India more than doubled its diamond purchases from Russia in March in annual terms to 728,000 carats amid falling supplies from Belgium and the UAE, Sputnik calculated according to the Indian Ministry of Industry and Commerce.
At the same time, India increased imports of stones from Canada - up to 354 thousand carats from just 210 carats in March last year. Diamond imports from China also jumped up 2.6 times to 122,000 carats, while supplies from Hong Kong increased by 15 per cent.
However, even this growth did not help to compensate for the drop in shipments from Belgium - its exports to India fell by 2 million carats, to 2.1 million, as well as from the UAE - by 900 thousand carats, to 7.3 million carats.
The import of stones from the USA (3.7 times, to 155 thousand carats), Israel (1.8 times, to 110 thousand carats), Botswana (-12%, 214 thousand carats) and South Africa (-2%, 255 thousand carats) also decreased.
As a result, India's total diamond imports fell to 12.15 million carats from 14.7 million a year earlier.
Starting from 1 March, Western countries began to gradually restrict imports of Russian diamonds processed in third countries.
Following this, a number of Western media circulated a letter sent to the Antwerp International Diamond Centre (AWDC) by businessmen involved in the diamond trade. In it, they stated the long and costly delays they were already facing, as well as the negative impact of the restrictions on all their operations, and called for a review of the new procedures "due to the threat of undermining the centuries-old diamond trade in Antwerp".
In response, the regulator admitted that the sanctions had led to disruptions in shipments to the world's largest diamond trading hub in Belgium's Antwerp due to new requirements for declaration and customs clearance of the gems.