Lay off Naomi – Farrow’s the celebrity culprit here

Why is everyone down on Naomi Campbell for accepting diamonds, or what she calls "dirty stones", from former Liberian president Charles Taylor? Never mind Naomi - the really outrageous, diva-esque, crazed celebrity in this story is her accuser, Mia Farrow.

Campbell only did what supermodels do all the time: as she testified at The Hague yesterday, she accepted a pouch of diamonds from men who knocked on her hotel door. She didn't even look in the bag until she'd got her beauty sleep.

Farrow, however, seems to fancy herself as a one-woman saviour of the Dark Continent. Having agitated for war against the savages of Sudan as part of her campaign to 'Save Darfur' a few years ago, she now wants to help reveal The Truth about Charles Taylor, by giving evidence against Campbell, and by extension against the former warlord.

Campbell might be a naive catwalk-strutter, but Farrow is something worse: a celebrity imperialist, labouring under a White Woman's Burden to save Africa from itself.

The actress is due to appear in person at The Hague next week, having already sworn an affidavit asserting that in South Africa in 1997, at a dinner hosted by Nelson Mandela, Campbell was given 'blood diamonds' by Taylor's people.

Campbell admitted yesterday that she had received a bag of diamonds, albeit rather miserable dirty ones. But given that there was no note explaining their provenance, she was unable to finger Taylor, as the prosecution had hoped. She also made it very clear that she did not want to attend the trial at The Hague, but had been subpoenaed to attend. "I was made to be here," she said. "This is a big inconvenience for me."

The same cannot be said for Farrow. She couldn't wait to get involved. She scribbled her affidavit and gave a primetime interview with ABC News in which she recalled the events of 1997 and explained the importance of her telling "the truth".

This is because Farrow really does believe she's a whiter-than-white celebrity activist who has a duty to fix those less-white parts of the world.

A few years back she was calling for Western militarism in Sudan. As part of the 'Save Darfur' antics she and other celebs arranged for a Black Hawk helicopter to be placed on Second Avenue in New York with a banner pleading: 'Send me to Darfur'.

Perhaps she has never seen the film Black Hawk Down, which might have given her a clue as to the kind of barbarism that can occur when the Pentagon does send fighter helicopters to African countries (in that instance, Somalia).

Frustrated by the unwillingness of Washington to send the military to Darfur, Farrow held talks with Blackwater, the super-controversial private military firm that wrought so much destruction in Iraq. She was effectively trying to organise her own Mia's Military, to put the mad blacks Over There back in their place.

She played a key role in dumbing down the complex conflict in Darfur, presenting it to Westerners as a simple case of "good vs evil". And ironically, for an actress who got into bed with the notorious Blackwater outfit, she campaigned extensively to have Khartoum officials sent to The Hague to be tried for crimes against humanity.

When she failed on that front, too, she had to make do with playing her Hollywood colonialist card at The Hague instead. ·