Jolie’s ring swap backfires, steals focus from humanitarian trip

Angelina Jolie may have taken off her blinding diamond engagement ring during her humanitarian visit to Africa this week, but the fact that the 37-year-old replaced it with a gold band seemed to take more attention away from her cause than her pricey rock would have.
Headlines around the web have been touting the fact Jolie was wearing the “mysterious” ring, and speculating on whether the mom of six and fiancé Brad Pitt actually secretly tied the knot.
More than likely, Jolie, who serves as a special envoy to the U.N.’s refugee agency, simply replaced the ring with the simpler band out of respect, preferring not to tour refugee camps while donning an extravagant gemstone that’s reported to be 16 carats and worth at least $500,000.
The “Changeling” star has been traveling with British Foreign Secretary William Hague and met with survivors of sexual assaults at a Congo refugee camp to raise awareness about the fact that, in many parts of the world, rape is frequently used as a weapon of war.
The issue is one Jolie has been passionate about for some time and brought to the big screen when she wrote and directed 2012’s “In the Land of Blood and Honey,” a film focused on the Bosnian war, including the mass rapes that occurred during that time.
“We often find temporary solutions and we talk a lot but it’s not often that you find somebody who is working on an initiative that is so much about finding solutions and finally putting an end to this,” Jolie told Britain’s Channel 4 News during a stop in Rwanda on Monday. “I know it sounds like a big dream, but it’s finally time and I think it is possible to put violence against women and rape as a crime of war as absolutely the center of what we must tackle. These women need our help.”