Archangel Diamond Corporation Announces the Appointment of Mr. Franco Boulle as Chairman and CEO Archangel Diamond Corporation Announces the Appointment of Mr. Franco Boulle as Chairman and CEO.

VANCOUVER, British Columbia--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 17, 1996--ARCHANGEL DIAMOND CORP(VSE: AAD VSE: AAD ) Archangel Diamond Corporation is pleased to announce that Mr. Franco Boulle has joined the Company as Chairman and CEO.

Mr. Boulle replaces Mr. Anthony Grist who has resigned as Chairman and CEO but will continue as an advisor to the Company. Mr. Boulle, together with his brother Jean Boulle, founded the Boulle Partnership, and some of the properties acquired by the partnership became the cornerstone upon which Diamond Fields Resources Inc. and American Mineral Fields Inc. were structured. Mr. Boulle has been involved in various facets of the diamond business for the past twenty years and the Board believes that his corporate vision, experience and expertise will play a key role in the Company's growth over the coming years.

The Company is also please to report that the first hole of the first-stage evaluation program on Pipe 441, Verkhotina Project, has been completed. the hole, sited 40 meters east and 80 meters north of the discovery hole, intersected the rim of the kimberlite crater from 72 to 91.2 meters. A total of 112.7 kg of kimberlite core was recovered. Analysis of the core was done, for macro diamonds only, at AG'S processing plant in Pomorye, Russia, and yielded 13 macro diamonds (larger than 0.5 mm), weighing 0.092 carats in total. Two stones were larger than 1 mm. Of the 13 diamonds recovered, 7 were gem quality, 3 near gem and 3 industrial quality. This second hole points to a diamond grade of 81.19 carats per 100 tonnes, slightly higher than the average grade of 77 carats per 100 tonnes of the nearby Lomonosova diamond deposit.

Elisey Verichev, who is in charge of the Verkhotina exploration program and who helped discover the Lomonosova deposit stated: "The results received by drilling on Pipe 441 indicate that this pipe is the biggest discovery in NW Russia during the past ten years. The pipe differs chemically and mineralogically from all other pipes in the region and is more closely correlated with the classical kimberlites of South Africa and Yakutia, Russia."

Dr. Luc Rombouts has reviewed the results and stated: "The grade (0.8 carats/tonne) of the commercial-sized diamonds (larger than 0.5 mm) from the second drill hole into Pipe 441 confirms and is even better than the grade obtained in the discovery hole. The first samples were from the crater facies, which in the Arkhangelsk region, tend to have lower grades than the underlying diatrema facies. Even though results are in the early stages, they are better than the results obtained in the Zolotitsa (Lomonosova) pipes at a similar stage."

The second and third holes of the evaluation program are underway. The second hole intersected kimberlite at 67 meters and is now at a depth of 190 meters and is in kimberlite. The third hole has just started. In light of the Pipe 441 results, the joint venture has reprocessed the geophysical data and have identified anomalies similar to 441 in the same structural setting and will commence drilling these in the next month.

The Company also announces that it has granted 1,100,000 of incentive stock options to employees and directors at a price of $4.00 per share. The options have expiry dates ranging from 3 to 5 years.

ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD

Mark A. Godsy, Director

The Vancouver Stock Exchange has not reviewed and does not accept responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

CONTACT: Archangel Diamond Corporation

Bill Trenaman, 604/687-4452

604/685-9317 (Fax)

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