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by Will Purcell

The diamond and specialty minerals stocks box score for Tuesday was a weak 73-93-145 as the TSX Venture Exchange fell four points to 622. Ewan Mason's Star Diamond Corp. (DIAM) fell one-half cent to nine cents on 32,000 shares.

Investors are still awaiting word about the FalCon joint venture with Rio Tinto Exploration Canada Inc. (RTEC) in central Saskatchewan. The two companies have been locked in a sitzkrieg for over a year since RTEC shocked the market with word it was putting the project on care and maintenance and looking at leaving the joint venture. Star and its shareholders had been anticipating a $100-million exploration budget, but whatever gets spent from here will come from Star's own coffers -- and then only after RTEC and Star agree on a divorce settlement.

Mr. Mason, heavily gagged by his lawyers as the negotiations continue, muffled an opinion a month ago, suggesting a deal was imminent. He did caution that agreements generally take about twice as long as expected, but he was optimistic there would be news before the end of July. Unfortunately, the month is passing without a peep about whether RTEC will be returning the 75-per-cent interest in FalCon to Star Diamond -- and on what terms it will be freed from its obligation to keep fronting Star its share of agreed costs to a production decision.

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