Sydney (dpa) – Rio Tinto Ltd on Tuesday hung a For Sale sign on its diamond mining interests in Australia, Zimbabwe, Canada and India. “We have a valuable, high-quality diamonds business, but given its scale we are reviewing whether we can create more value through a different ownership structure,” Rio's diamonds spokesman Harry Kenyon-Slaney said in a statement. Rio's move comes five months after fellow Anglo-Australian mining giant BHP Billiton put its Ekati diamond mine in Canada up for sale. Kenyon-Slaney said diamond mining was a good business but no longer a good fit with a company that makes most of its money in iron ore. It was at Rio's Argyle mine in Australia's west that the biggest-ever pink diamond was extracted earlier this year. Argyle, which has been going for 26 years, is currently being revamped from an open-pit mine to an underground mine. Rio is looking to sell the combined mining interests on sale for over 1 billion Australian dollars (1.05 billion US dollars). Rio shares, which opened the day at 64.25 Australian dollars, closed the session at 64.10 Australian dollars. BM ShortURL: http://goo.gl/vjjLB Tags: Australia, Diamonds, Mines, Rio Tinto, Sale Section: Business, Latest News, Oceana
