Pubdate: Thu, 14 Mar 2002 Source: Indianapolis Star (IN) Copyright: 2002 Indianapolis Newspapers Inc. Contact: http://www.starnews.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/210 Author: Michael C. Bender, Cox News Service DEA WANTS TO REOPEN OFFICE IN KABUL Federal Drug Agency Seeks $17.4 Million To Fight Opium Production, Heroin Trafficking In Central Asia. WASHINGTON -- As part of the war on terrorism, the head of the Drug Enforcement Administration Wednesday called for reopening the DEA office in Kabul, which was closed after the Soviets withdrew from Afghanistan in 1989. "The DEA has received multi-source information that (Osama) bin Laden has been involved in the financing and facilitation of heroin trafficking activities," Asa Hutchinson told a Senate Judiciary subcommittee. As part of "Operation Containment," Hutchinson is asking for $17.4 million to attack heroin trafficking and opium production in Central Asia. The Taliban helped fund itself during the past several years by taxing the lucrative drug trade, Hutchinson said. In the winter of 1994, when the Taliban first emerged and conquered Kandahar, Afghanistan produced about 2,200 metric tons of opium per year -- the second most of any country in the world, according to the United Nations Drugs Control Program. In 1997, as Taliban control extended to Kabul and further north, Afghanistan's opium production increased 27 percent, to 2,800 metric tons. With the Taliban controlling 90 percent of the country in 2000, 3,656 metric tons of opium were produced, or as much as 75 percent of the world's supply, according to DEA statistics. Hamid Karzai, Afghanistan's interim leader, banned opium poppy production in January, but Hutchinson said it would mean little without enforcement. "We cannot have a successful operation in Afghanistan to reduce the warehouses, the supply, the transportation of this heroin without building a good law enforcement component in Afghanistan, without the DEA being physically present there," Hutchinson said. - --- MAP posted-by: Beth