Business
Afghan Officials Find Precious Stones in Presidential Palace
(Last Updated On: October 24, 2022)
An Afghan delegation including the Ministry of Mines Engineers and Presidency’s Preservation and Services departments have discovered a number of precious stones in one of the Presidential Palace’s rooms.
The President’s office said these stones were moved to the Presidential Palace for preservation after a rocket hit the Ministry of Mines and Petroleum in 1992.
Officials of Ministry of Mines, engineer Mirza and Muhammad Nabi Mutahari noted that the magnitude and quality of these stones are not precisely known, but they are of different types, including Azure, Granite, Agate, Amethyst, Braille, Microlite, Technical Tourmaline, Gray and other types.
The Presidential Palace said the stones will be preserved in ARG.
Afghanistan has been blessed with a great variety of precious and semi-precious stones with 73 records of mines, deposits, occurrences, and showings.
In fact, some of the earliest records of mining anywhere in the world are from Afghanistan, dating back over 6000 years.
By some estimates, the untapped gemstone deposits in this country are estimated to be worth $300 billion USD.
However, the geological surveying of the country has been less than 10% of the area! Precious minerals, oil, and gas have been estimated to be in the 1 trillion to 3 trillion USD ranges.
It’s no wonder why Afghanistan is quickly moving to try to mine and develop so many of these resources.