KANDAHAR, Afghanistan -- A drive by the NATO alliance to disrupt Afghanistan's drug trade has been hobbled by new objections from member nations that say their laws do not permit soldiers to carry out such operations, according to senior commanders here. The objections are being raised despite an agreement two months ago that the alliance's campaign in Afghanistan would be broadened to include attacks on narcotics facilities, traffickers, middlemen and drug lords whose profits help to finance insurgent groups. During a recent visit here, Gen. John Craddock, NATO's supreme allied commander, expressed surprise upon learning of what he described as a gap between the decision by alliance defense ministers to authorize aggressive counternarcotics missions and the lack of follow-through because of objections from several of the countries that make up the NATO force in Afghanistan. [continues 987 words]
The Third In Our Series On Life In Afghanistan Reveals That In Helmand Province No Part Of Society Is Free From The Economic Impact Of Drugs Or The Prevailing Culture Of Corruption The smuggler Hameedullah's family live in one big house on a dusty unpaved lane - Hameedullah, his five sons and their wives, children, grandchildren and two cousins. Hameedullah, a tall, thickset man, is a government employee. And like many people in Helmand, he is also a poppy farmer. Like any other farmer, he was concerned by water, and crop prices. "People plant poppy because it's good money, it needs little water and it makes a good harvest," he said. "Prices were very low last year because everyone planted poppy. Wheat is very good this year because prices are high, so most of the people are planting wheat this year. I divided my land half wheat and half poppy, but next year we will plant poppy again." [continues 1487 words]
UNITED NATIONS -- Afghanistan has produced so much opium in recent years that the Taliban are cutting poppy cultivation and stockpiling raw opium in an effort to support prices and preserve a major source of financing for the insurgency, Antonio Maria Costa, the executive director of the United Nations drug office, says. Mr. Costa made his remarks to reporters last week as his office prepared to release its latest survey of Afghanistan's opium crop. Issued Thursday, it showed that poppy cultivation had retreated in much of the country and was now overwhelmingly concentrated in the 7 of 34 provinces where the insurgency remains strong, most of those in the south. [continues 751 words]
Eradication Effort, Along With Drought and a Global Food Shortage That Boosted the Price of Wheat, Cut Production of the Crop, Which Is Used to Make Heroin. After seven years of extraordinary expansion, Afghanistan's harvest of poppies used to produce opium has declined by 6% from a record high in 2007, according to the annual opium survey by the United Nations released Thursday. The amount of land used to cultivate opium declined by 19%, to about 388,000 acres. "We are finally seeing the results of years of effort of making some areas completely free of opium harvesting," said Antonio Maria Costa, the executive director of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. Opium production is now concentrated in seven provinces in the southwestern part of the country. [continues 730 words]
MOSCOW -- Opium production in Afghanistan has increased by 150 per cent since a NATO-led security and development mission entered the country in 2001, Russia's Federal Drug Control Service said yesterday. "Afghanistan has become the absolute leader in narcotics production, producing 93 per cent of the world's entire opiates. Afghan drug dealers have in two years set up the successful production of cannabis (marijuana, hashish) with over 70,000 hectares of land being cultivated, taking Afghanistan into second place in the world behind Morocco in terms of the cultivation of such drugs," the service said in a statement. [continues 125 words]
Heroin Trade; Take Action Against Operations Tied To Insurgency KABUL, AFGHANISTAN - The product is hidden in transport trucks, hauled on the back of donkeys and finally spirited through villages that straddle Afghanistan's northern border. Being part of the world's largest heroin industry certainly has its benefits, but the work, says one Afghan drug smuggler, is no walk in the park. To move narcotics from Afghanistan's Pashtun belt -- where Canadian troops operate -- to Tajikistan, smugglers risk arrest by the police, theft at the hands of other criminals or worse, says the Kabulbased courier, who asked not to be named. [continues 512 words]
Goal To Give Farmers An Alternative To Growing Poppies KANDAHAR -- Canada is providing $1.2 million to buy wheat seeds and fertilizer for thousands of Afghan farmers, but the Taliban warn they may attack any foreigners who attempt to distribute the seeds. The money will pay for 293 tonnes of wheat seed, to supply more than 5,000 farmers with 50 kilograms each, and plant a total of 2,000 hectares of land. "We look forward to working with the governor of Kandahar to sow these seeds of peace," said Elissa Golberg, head of Canadian development operations in Kandahar province. [continues 263 words]
(CNS) - Canada is providing $1.2 million to buy wheat seeds and fertilizer for thousands of Afghan farmers, but the Taliban warn they may attack any foreigners who attempt to distribute the seeds. The money will pay for 293 tonnes of wheat seed, to supply more than 5,000 farmers with 50 kilograms each, and plant a total of 2,000 hectares of land. "We look forward to working with the governor of Kandahar to sow these seeds of peace," said Elissa Golberg, head of Canadian development operations in Kandahar province. [continues 223 words]
Afghanistan Wants High-Tech Help From NATO To Track Smugglers KABUL - The product is hidden in transport trucks, hauled on the back of donkeys and finally spirited through villages that straddle Afghanistan's northern border. Being part of the world's largest heroin industry certainly has its benefits. but the work, says one Afghan drug smuggler, is no walk in the park. To move narcotics from Afghanistan's Pashtun belt -- where Canadian troops operate -- to Tajikistan, smugglers risk arrest by the police, theft at the hands of other criminals, or worse, says the Kabul-based courier, who asked not to be named. [continues 664 words]
Afghan Heroin Traffickers May Soon Have Something New To Worry About KABUL - The product is hidden in transport trucks, hauled on the backs of donkeys and finally spirited through villages that straddle Afghanistan's northern border. Being part of the world's largest heroin industry certainly has its benefits, but the work, says one Afghan drug smuggler, is no walk in the park. To move narcotics from Afghanistan's Pashtun belt -- where Canadian troops operate -- to Tajikistan, smugglers risk arrest by the police, theft at the hands of other criminals, or worse, says the Kabul-based courier, who asked not to be named. [continues 437 words]
Stopping Traffickers Will Hurt Taliban KABUL -- The product is hidden in transport trucks, hauled on the back of donkeys and finally spirited through villages that straddle Afghanistan's northern border. Being part of the world's largest heroin industry certainly has its benefits but the work, says one Afghan drug smuggler, is no walk in the park. To move narcotics from Afghanistan's Pashtun belt -- where Canadian troops operate -- to Tajikistan, smugglers risk arrest by the police, theft at the hands of other criminals, or worse, says the Kabul-based courier, who asked not to be named. [continues 759 words]
KABUL -- The product is hidden in transport trucks, hauled on the back of donkeys and finally spirited through villages that straddle Afghanistan's northern border. Being part of the world's largest heroin industry certainly has its benefits but the work, says one Afghan drug smuggler, is no walk in the park. To move narcotics from Afghanistan's Pashtun belt -- where Canadian troops operate -- to Tajikistan, smugglers risk arrest by the police, theft at the hands of other criminals, or worse, says the Kabul-based courier, who asked not to be named. [continues 689 words]
KABUL - The product is hidden in transport trucks, hauled on the back of donkeys and finally spirited through villages that straddle Afghanistan's northern border. Being part of the world's largest heroin industry certainly has its benefits but the work, says one Afghan drug smuggler, is no walk in the park. To move narcotics from Afghanistan's Pashtun belt -- where Canadian troops operate -- to Tajikistan, smugglers risk arrest by the police, theft at the hands of other criminals, or worse, says the Kabul-based courier, who asked not to be named. [continues 440 words]
Efforts To Cut Off Taliban Funding. Some NATO Countries Raise Concerns About Counter-Narcotics Operations Canadian troops in Afghanistan will soon target opium-processing laboratories and high-level drug barons in an effort to cut off funding for the Taliban, says Canada's top soldier. But Canadian Forces personnel will not conduct operations to eradicate poppy fields, says General Walter Natynczyk, chief of the Defence staff. This month, NATO defence ministers agreed to target Afghan drug networks in an attempt to reduce the amount of money the Taliban has to fund its insurgency. [continues 393 words]
VICTORIA -- Canadian troops in Afghanistan will soon target opium-processing laboratories and high-level drug barons in an effort to cut off funding for the Taliban, says Canada's top soldier. But Canadian Forces personnel will not conduct operations to eradicate poppy fields, says Gen. Walter Natynczyk, chief of the defence staff. Earlier this month, NATO defence ministers agreed to target Afghan drug networks in an attempt to reduce the amount of money the Taliban has to fund its insurgency. NATO officials estimate the Taliban receive between $80 and $100 million a year from the drug trade, either by taxing the production and transportation of opium, or from payments from drug lords who want protection. [continues 150 words]
The United States on Thursday pushed NATO allies to order their troops to target Afghanistan's thriving heroin trade in a bid to stem the flow of drug money to the widening insurgency against the troubled international military mission. A two-day meeting of NATO defense ministers comes amid an increase in violence that has created doubts about whether Western forces can win the war against the resurgent Taliban militants. "If we have the opportunity to go after drug lords and drug laboratories and try and interrupt this flow of cash to the Taliban, that seems to me like a legitimate security endeavor," said U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates at the meeting. [continues 542 words]
WASHINGTON -- When Afghan security forces found an enormous cache of heroin hidden beneath concrete blocks in a tractor-trailer outside Kandahar in 2004, the local Afghan commander quickly impounded the truck and notified his boss. Before long, the commander, Habibullah Jan, received a telephone call from Ahmed Wali Karzai, the brother of President Hamid Karzai, asking him to release the vehicle and the drugs, Mr. Jan later told American investigators, according to notes from the debriefing obtained by The New York Times. He said he complied after getting a phone call from an aide to President Karzai directing him to release the truck. [continues 1762 words]
Heroin Addiction On Rise, Tehran Official Warns Britain Points To Decrease In Land Used For Cultivation Young Iranians are paying the price for NATO's "failure" to curb opium production in neighbouring Afghanistan, according to the Iranian government. Iran's deputy foreign minister, Mehdi Safari, made the complaint at the end of a three-day visit to Britain, after talks with the foreign secretary, David Miliband, and other Foreign Office and Downing Street officials, in an attempt to improve relations. One of the few areas of cooperation between Iran and Britain is counter-narcotics, but Safari expressed frustration at what the Iranian government sees as a lack of progress. [continues 407 words]
Afghanistan Need Small Loans To Grow Wheat An old man waits with his two sons outside of a United Nation's distribution centre on a scorching August day in Kandahar City. They have been enticed from the Arghandab district west of the city by the promise of a single bag of wheat to take back to their impoverished family. He says he arrived here at 8 a.m., but four hours later he, along with dozens of others, still doesn't have his wheat, and he's losing his patience. [continues 624 words]
New figures from the United Nations to be released this week are set to reveal that opium production in the southern regions of Afghanistan has soared. The worst affected province is Helmand, where 7,000 British soldiers are deployed. Officials are likely to stress successes in the north and east of the country, where the number of provinces free of poppy is set to rise. Last year 13 provinces across the country were declared free of opium cultivation - largely in the relatively secure north. [continues 348 words]
Recent Meeting at Canadian Embassy With Impatient U.S. Envoy Left Afghan Politicians Feeling Bitter and Insulted KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN -- Long-simmering tensions between the Afghan government and its Western supporters over the opium trade have broken out into angry confrontations behind closed doors recently, including a stormy recent meeting at the Canadian embassy. Accounts vary about exactly what happened when U.S. Ambassador William Wood sat down with his Canadian counterpart and a gathering of Kandahar's political leaders on July 12, but five sources who attended the session described it as a strong sign of rising U.S. impatience with the local government's stand on drugs. [continues 1017 words]
Ex-Drug Dealer James Brett Has Beaten His Own Demons. He Tells Mark Collings He Now Hopes to Take on the Opium Growers - With Pomegranates 'Pomegranates are the answer to all this,' said James Brett, as we drove past the colourless, mud-brick villages and makeshift graveyards that litter the parched landscape of Nangarhar province. We were on our way to Markoh, a small village 40 minutes' drive inside the Afghan border with Pakistan. Brett first visited Markoh in April 2007. On his way to a seminar in Kabul, he had asked the driver to stop the car so that he could speak to a reed-thin figure extracting opium from the poppies. [continues 1170 words]
Taliban Windfall Puts Troops At Risk OTTAWA -Canadian soldiers escorting me outside a remote Afghan National Army base last summer didn't give it a second thought as their boots crunched thousands of dried poppy bulbs sapped of their narcotic resin. It was, after all, Kandahar -- now more than ever an incubator for most of the world's opium supply. Raked into metre-high piles, the empty pods were the residue of a largest-ever poppy crop in a country that feeds 92% of the planet's heroin addictions, according to the latest United Nations World Drug Report. [continues 650 words]
Almas Bawar Zakhilwal, an Afghani living in Canada, says the poppy eradication program in his country is a failure and stepping it up would only fuel the war. Canadian troops are not part of the poppy eradication program; it has been contracted out to DynCorp International, an American company, which also provides bodyguards for Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai. "Billions have been spent with no success," Zakhilwal said in a telephone interview. Zakhilwal is Canadian representative of the Senlis Council, a Paris-based organization which advocates licensing poppy production to make medical morphine. [continues 285 words]
To mark the International Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking, which falls on June 26, Perspective today begins a series of articles related to drug problems in Thailand and the region. In the following article, JAMES EMERY looks at the situation in Afghanistan, where the Taleban are, and have always been, drug traffickers. Afghanistan's 2008 opium crop is expected to produce similar yields as last year's record of 8,243 metric tonnes, according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). [continues 842 words]
GARMSER, Afghanistan - The Marines of Bravo Company's 1st Platoon sleep beside a field of poppies. Troops in the 2nd Platoon playfully swat at the heavy opium bulbs while walking through the fields. Afghan laborers scraping the plant's gooey resin smile and wave. Last week, the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit moved into southern Helmand province, the world's largest region for growing opium poppy, and now they find themselves surrounded by green fields of the illegal plants that produce the main ingredient of heroin. [continues 310 words]
In Afghanistan, Compensating For Ruined Crops Is A Tricky Task; Canadian Forces PANJWAII DISTRICT, Afghanistan - When paying compensation to Afghans for collateral damage from military operations, Canadian Forces have drawn a line in the sand where the poppies grow. Soldiers in the Mushan region were in a unique bind recently after their 83-vehicle convoy rumbled over two crops -- one wheat, one poppy -- to set up an overnight security perimeter. Land was torn up and both crops ground into the mud. The wheat farmer would have to be compensated, but the poppy growers presented a Catch-22. Replacement Canadian and Afghanistan soldiers in the region had just arrived that day. Angering locals by not paying for poppies was a poor start for soldiers about to forge new relationships. But the alternative was to finance the drug trade. [continues 356 words]
The assault in the east is the latest by militants against government teams responsible for destroying the opium poppy crop. U.S. Marines encounter little resistance in their offensive in the south. KABUL, AFGHANISTAN -- A suicide bomber and gunmen attacked a drug-eradication team in eastern Afghanistan on Tuesday, killing at least 19 people and injuring more than 40 others, authorities said. Twelve police officers were among the dead in the assault, the latest in a string of attacks by militants against government teams responsible for destroying the lucrative opium poppy crop during the planting season. The insurgency is fueled with profits from the drug trade. [continues 438 words]
Lack of support from foreign troops for Afghanistan's poppy-eradication operation costing lives, he says KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN -- Foreign troops have undermined the Afghan government's poppy-eradication campaign in Kandahar, the governor says, and the lack of support has added to the risks of the operation. At least 13 police have been killed and one reported missing during poppy eradication so far this month, and the task has been more difficult, Governor Asadullah Khalid said, because his NATO allies refuse to help and, in some cases, appear to be blocking the effort. [continues 539 words]
Treatment Centers for Women Reflect Increasing Opium Use KABUL -- The first days were so painful that Mina Gul could barely sit upright. Thin and lanky with wide brown eyes, she rubbed the back of her neck ceaselessly with fingers stained reddish black by an opium pipe. She couldn't shake the nausea. The light was almost blinding in the clean, white-walled medical clinic, where she lay crumpled in bed for days. Before that, opium had been about the only thing keeping Gul afloat. It started four years ago with the headaches. A relative told her to try a bit of opium as a cure. "I tried it once a little -- then the next day more, then more again, and then I was addicted," Gul said. [continues 639 words]
In the Country's Poppy-Growing Provinces, Farmers Are Being Forced to Sell Their Daughters to Pay Loans. Khalida's father says she's 9-or maybe 10. As much as Sayed Shah loves his 10 children, the functionally illiterate Afghan farmer can't keep track of all their birth dates. Khalida huddles at his side, trying to hide beneath her chador and headscarf. They both know the family can't keep her much longer. Khalida's father has spent much of his life raising opium, as men like him have been doing for decades in the stony hillsides of eastern Afghanistan and on the dusty southern plains. [continues 2022 words]
Insurgency's Foot Soldiers Are Motivated by Loved Ones Lost to NATO Planes and Money Lost to Poppy-Eradication Programs Air strikes and drug eradication are feeding the insurgency in southern Afghanistan, as those actions convince some villagers that their lives and livelihoods are under attack. In a unique survey, The Globe and Mail interviewed 42 ordinary Taliban foot soldiers in Kandahar and discovered 12 fighters who said their family members had died in air strikes, and 21 who said their poppy fields had been targeted for destruction by anti-drug teams. [continues 2261 words]
British Forces Take Exception To NATO Reluctance For Action Helmand Province British special forces are conducting covert operations against drug smugglers in southern Afghanistan for the first time. The operations represent a shift from the British military's long-held opposition to direct involvement in Afghanistan's drugs war. British special forces in Helmand province had previously been limited to targeting members of the Taliban leadership. The operations are being conducted at night with members of Battalion 333, a secretive unit from the elite Afghan counter-narcotics police. [continues 264 words]
TARIN KOT, Afghanistan -- On a recent cold spring day, just as the first small sprouts of poppies began pushing out of the southern Afghanistan earth, the members of Uruzgan province's poppy eradication council gathered around a wood stove in the governor's compound here for their first meeting. "We should encourage people to eliminate poppies voluntarily," offered one official. "Ministers will go to the radio stations and tell them to stop. Mullahs should go to the mosques and tell people it's forbidden by Islam." [continues 1278 words]
The Afghan ministry set up to tackle the drugs trade is facing a staffing crisis after the UK, on the instructions of the Kabul government, withdrew funding for salaries. The best-educated workers at the fledgling ministry of counter-narcotics, which is intended to play a key role in reducing the country's poppy crop, have been looking for other jobs after pay for senior staff dropped from $1,500 (=801,011, UKP762) to $200 a month. The ministry said 30 senior workers had left since November when pay was cut. [continues 339 words]
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- Afghanistan will produce another enormous opium poppy crop this year, close to last year's record harvest, and Europe and other regions should brace themselves for the expected influx of heroin, the United Nations warned in its annual winter survey of poppy planting patterns. Cultivation is still increasing in the insurgency-hit south and west of the country, the report said, and taxes on the crop have become a major source of revenue for the Taliban insurgency. "This is a windfall for antigovernment forces, further evidence of the dangerous link between opium and insurgency," Antonio Maria Costa, the executive director of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, wrote in the report's preface. [continues 521 words]
Afghanistan, the world's biggest opium producer, is set for another bumper crop this year, providing a windfall for the Taliban who tax farmers to finance their fight against government and foreign forces. More than six years after US-led and Afghan forces toppled the Taliban, the failure to bring opium production under control means Afghanistan is now locked in a vicious circle. Drug money fuels the Taliban insurgency and corruption, weakening government control over large parts of the country, which in turn allows more opium to be produced. [continues 494 words]
Europe And Other Major Heroin Markets Should Brace Themselves For Health Consequences Of Harvest, Warns UN Afghanistan's opium economy will take up to 20 years to eradicate and require a UKP1bn investment from world leaders, according to a government study published yesterday. The 102-page report was welcomed by the international development secretary, Douglas Alexander, even though it contains some highly critical messages about the effectiveness of some of the aid programmes. Compiled by the Department of International Development and the World Bank, the analysis suggests at least an extra UKP1bn needs to be invested in irrigation, roads, alternative crops and rural development to attract farmers away from the lucrative and growing opium industry. [continues 747 words]
Where opium poppies used to colour the plains of northern Afghanistan, towering cannabis plants now sway in the wind, filling the air with their pungent odour. Farmers in Balkh province were banned from cultivating opium last year and have switched to another cash crop, a rich source of income that is still tolerated by the authorities. Balkh's burgeoning hashish industry does not pay farmers quite as much as the heroin factories used to for good-quality opium. But the rich black cannabis resin produced around the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif still pays about four times the price of cotton or wheat. It is highly prized by Afghan users and is exported in large quantities to Pakistan and Europe. [continues 379 words]
The US government has conceded defeat in its attempt to persuade the Afghanistan government to begin the aerial destruction of poppy fields as part of its opium eradication strategy. "We have decided to stop pursuing the aerial spraying of poppy fields in Afghanistan," said Thomas Schweich, principal deputy assistant secretary for the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs. US officials have climbed down in the face of widespread criticism from the Afghan government and other coalition partners, notably the UK. [continues 369 words]
Disable Rebels With Opium Crackdown: Military Boss Taliban forces are weakening, but the way to ultimately eradicate insurgents in Afghanistan is by robbing them of their chief source of income: drug money. That's the opinion of Maj-Gen. Tim Grant, former leader of Canada's military operations in the wartorn country. Afghanistan is the world's largest heroin producing country, growing at least 90 per cent of the world's opium poppy supply in 2006. Permanently dismantling Afghanistan's opium industry requires more than just destroying the poppies, Grant told the Herald on Thursday. [continues 473 words]
Other than taking pot shots at Taliban soldiers, forests of massive marijuana plants are giving Canadian soldiers few options. Afghanistan is known for its poppy trade. But huge fields of marijuana plants, ranging from six to 12 feet high, are causing unique problems. "When we drive through them on a light armoured vehicle, the plants are taller than a vehicle itself," explained Gen. Rick Hillier yesterday. Taliban soldiers have been hiding in the forests, then jumping out to fire rocket-propelled grenades at vehicles. Because the plants retain energy, the insurgents can't be detected. [continues 132 words]
The general made an elementary mistake. Told by his superiors that his new posting as chief of police in a drug-rich northern province would cost him "one hundred and fifty thousand", he assumed the bribe to be in Afghan currency. He paid the money to a go-between at a rendezvous in Kabul's Najib Zarab carpet market. For two days he was lorded in the office of General Azzam, then Chief of Staff to the Interior Minister, helping himself to chocolate and biscuits. "I must have eaten a pound of the stuff," he recalled. [continues 977 words]
The head of the UN's anti-narcotics unit has called on Nato forces to crack down on heroin production in Afghanistan -- a policy which contradicts proposals by the Brown government. Gordon Brown will propose paying farmers more than they earn from their poppy harvests in return for ceasing to grow the crop when he makes a statement to the Commons in the next few weeks on his strategy for winning over Afghans and curbing the influence of the Taliban. Thus far the British campaign to destroy poppy production has been an abject failure, according to the annual report of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). The biggest growth area is in Helmand province, a Taliban stronghold, where British forces are fighting daily battles. [continues 412 words]
OTTAWA - Canadian military police have started using drug dogs to search troops' bags at Kandahar Air Field after being tipped about soldiers suspected of using heroin, hash and pot, say newly released documents. Although there were no drug seizures reported, a briefing note says illegal drugs are readily available in Afghanistan and present a "temptation for Canadian troops in the form of personal use and in the form of importation for the purpose of trafficking." The documents, obtained by The Canadian Press under the Access to Information Act, indicate there were at least five targeted and random searches of soldiers' belongings in June and July at Kandahar Air Field. [continues 446 words]
Opium With its economy in shambles, Afghanistan ranks near the bottom on almost every international indicator of human and economic development. In one sector, though, it leads the world, setting records year after year. Unfortunately, that sector is the heroin trade. Afghanistan produces more than 90% of the world's opium. As well as supplying addicts around the globe--causing an estimated 100,000 deaths a year -- the industry has fuelled corruption and instability at home, and bankrolled the Taliban insurgency. [continues 266 words]
KHWAJA GHOLAK, Afghanistan - Amid the multiplying frustrations of the fight against narcotics in Afghanistan, the northern province of Balkh has been hailed as a rare and glowing success. Two years ago the province, which abuts Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, was covered with opium poppies - about 27,000 acres of them, nearly enough to blanket Manhattan twice. This year, after an intense anti-poppy campaign led by the governor, Balkh's farmers abandoned the crop. The province was declared poppy free, with 12 others, and the provincial government was promised a reward of millions of dollars in development aid. [continues 952 words]
American military officials are carrying out a sweeping $2.5 billion overhaul of Afghanistan's police force that will include retraining the country's entire 72,000-member force and embedding 2,350 American and European advisers in police stations across the country. The new effort is a vast expansion of the current American program and is the third significant attempt to bolster the country's feeble police force since the American-led invasion in 2001. Improving the police force is a key to defeating the Taliban and salvaging the credibility of the central government, which is widely viewed as corrupt, according to Western officials. [continues 1044 words]
The Country Produces 93 Per Cent Of The World's Supply Of Opium KABUL -- Afghanistan, the world's biggest heroin producer, is struggling to cope with a drug problem as thousands of Afghans -- trying to cope with the traumas of war, displacement and poverty -- are becoming addicted to narcotics. On the outskirts of Kabul, a sprawling bombed-out building that was once a centre for culture and science is home to more than 100 squatters whose main concern is feeding their heroin habit. [continues 792 words]
British troops fighting a bitter insurgent war in Helmand province could be placed in even more danger if the Afghan government approves a new US-backed programme to eliminate the country's poppy-crop by spraying it with herbicide. UK officials leading the battle against the burgeoning opium output from the poppies say the policy would backfire by wiping out the livelihoods of tens of thousands of local farmers and could drive them into the arms of the Taliban. It might also wipe out food crops grown alongside the poppies and hand the insurgents a major propaganda victory by allowing them to claim that the West was waging chemical warfare on civilians. [continues 257 words]
Inside Afghanistan
