OFFICIAL-Alrosa sees diamond market improvement by year end

(Alrosa clarifies that its diamond prices fell by 6 percent since the start of the year and not just in May. Company also adds it expects market conditions to improve by year end)

TEL AVIV, June 16 (Reuters) - Russian diamond miner Alrosa has lowered rough diamond prices by 6 percent since the beginning of the year but expects market conditions to improve by the end of 2015, the company said on Tuesday.

Andrey Zharkov, who was appointed company president in April, told Reuters that its rough diamond prices fell 3 percent in February and another 3 percent at the company's May trading session.

"I think we saw the same going on with (diamond miner) De Beers' sight prices, according to the information we have," Zharkov said on the sidelines of a diamond conference in Tel Aviv.

De Beers is a unit of global miner Anglo American Plc (LSE: AAL.L - news) .

Alrosa, the world's top producer by output in carats, said it sees current prices as stable, but expects prices to rise by the end of the year. (Reporting by Ari Rabinovitch; Editing by Keith Weir)