Taliban and the Drug and Weapons Trade.

[dabong1]

NWFP Governor while addressing a funcation in connection with International Customs Day before settign huge amount of drugs on fire, said
The international Drug Mafia is fundding terrorism in Pakistan, particularly in NWFP".

Im trying to post more information after a while.

I would like your views on this.

I agree with him on this keeping view the booming narcotics in Afghanistan under the very nose of USA.

Pashtun Mafia - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I know wiki is not a good source,but it does give you the right leads.

 

[Spring Onion]

Pashtun Mafia - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I know wiki is not a good source,but it does give you the right leads.

At the moment the right lead is the War Lords in Afghanistan that are involved in massive drug trafficing and drug business.

and it is the main rootcause currently.

Most of the funding is coming through drugs grown in Afghanistan.

Intrestingly US and UK had become part of it.

Currently almost 90 % of fine quality drugs in US and European markets stem from Afghanistan and its shamfull that NATO/ US had closed eyes towards it.

 

[IceCold]

Currently almost 90 % of fine quality drugs in US and European markets stem from Afghanistan and its shamfull that NATO/ US had closed eyes towards it.[/QUOTE]

Well its because they have other priorities remember pakistani nukes getting in the hands of AQ.

 

[khanz]

thats why we need to seal the border mine and wall it up.

 

[mujahideen]

I just dont get it how is the U.S. threatening Pakistan when they cant control a country like Afghanistan. But one thing is for sure these Afghans ever since they steped foot on our soil have been slowly destroying Pakistan.

 

[dabong1]

I do find it stange that when the taliban where in power they got rid of the poppy plant,but once NATO come in ,the production is breaking records.

 

[Astra]

The US encouraged the smuggling of poppy into afganistan, to make the Soviet soldiers addicted to it. This seriously rendered their fighting skills.

The business still exists, nothing to be surprised.

 

[roadrunner]

The US encouraged the smuggling of poppy into afganistan, to make the Soviet soldiers addicted to it. This seriously rendered their fighting skills.

The business still exists, nothing to be surprised.

Is that a joke?

 

[MrConcerned]

The British are responsible for this debacle, as their solely controlled province, Helmand, is responsible for 95% of the drug trade. They really are no good at the counter-insurgency thing.

 

[roadrunner]

The British are responsible for this debacle, as their solely controlled province, Helmand, is responsible for 95% of the drug trade. They really are no good at the counter-insurgency thing.

Hardly. Most of the opium is cultivated in the Tajik areas. Those are the areas where the current Afghani government ministers, who are Tajik, are from.

 

[MrConcerned]

er, no, in terms of production, as you can see from your own map, most of it is produced in the Pathan areas in the south.

 

[roadrunner]

er, no, in terms of production, as you can see from your own map, most of it is produced in the Pathan areas in the south.

err, as you can see it is not. Opium production in the East of Afghanistan is virtually non existent. Opium production in the south of Afghanistan is quite high, but opium production in the West and North is also quite high.

Map of the main drug producing regions

Map of the ethnic groups


If you can't read maps, then your statements can hardly be taken as credible, especially with "Helmand producing 95% of Afghani opium". You might have a case if you said Helmand, Nimroz, Farah, Badakhshan, etc together produced 80% of Afghani opium, but even then you wouldn't be correct.

 

[MrConcerned]

true, I made an error.

But saying that the Northern Alliance are the ones responsible for drug production is just as wrong. Your map clearly shows that the Pathans are harvesting poppies with great enthusiasm.

 

[roadrunner]

Think the shadings represent the whole province, so there's three big proviinces in the South outputting that much, whereas the two smaller provinces of Balkh and Badakhshan output the same category. But it does seem Helmand does produce a lot of poppy cultivation. I'd still say that the Pashtun areas in the East have the least poppy cultivation though. The South does seem to be more poppy filled (as does the North).

 

[Cheetah786]

AFGHAN OPIUM PRODUCTION SOARS BY HALF IN 2006

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) says illegal opium production in Afghanistan increased by nearly half in 2006 compared to the record harvest of a year earlier.

In a report released today in Vienna, the UNODC says Afghanistan accounted for practically all the world’s illegal opium production during 2006.

The report says Afghanistan produced dramatically more opium in 2006, increasing its yield by almost 50 percent from a year earlier and pushing global opium production to a new record high.

The authors say that the Afghan increase boosted global opium production from 3,800 tons in 2005 to 6,600 tons in 2006. Opium is the main ingredient for heroin.

’Weak Link’

UNODC research expert Thomas Pietschmann says Afghanistan is clearly a black spot in the world when it comes to cultivation of the opium poppy.

"The really serious problem we face in the world, this is Afghanistan," Pietschmann says. "Ninety-two percent of the world’s [opium] production is in Afghanistan. We have seen a dramatic increase in production in the year 2006 -- 49 percent in production in Afghanistan -- mostly in southern provinces. And there is no question that Afghanistan is the weak link at the moment."

UNODC Executive Director Antonio Maria Costa warns that within Afghanistan, the insurgency-plagued southern province of Helmand is becoming the center of supply, with illicit cultivation larger than in the rest of the country put together.

Costa says that if the opium production in Helmand could be curbed, it would rid the world of the most dangerous source of its most dangerous narcotic. He blames the endemic poverty, corruption, and warfare for creating the right conditions for such massive production of illegal drugs.

"The situation in Afghanistan is not acceptable, but not only because of the drug situation -- because of the poverty, because of instability, because of the corruption, because of the insurgency," Costa says. "The great increase in drug cultivation and [drug] processing which we have seen in the last couple of years is a consequence of that. It’s not necessarily the trigger of all that."

Poppy Density

The report says that no other drug in the world is produced in such a concentrated, single area.

Pietschmann says that what is needed to wean farmers away from poppy cultivation is to end the insurgency and give local farmers an alternative with which they can earn money. He says that, at present, the link between the Taliban-led insurgency and the cultivation of opium poppies is clear.

"What has to be done is a combination of strengthening the rule of law -- there’s a lot of insurgents in the south of the country, precisely in these areas where you have the highest levels of cultivation and production in the country -- but in parallel, you have to strengthen alternative development assistance going to the farmers," Pietschmann says. "At the moment, because there is such an insurgency, all of the alternative development programs are not working in the south of the country. So you have to break this vicious circle."

Another significant change in the illegal drug market is that laboratories inside Afghanistan are now converting 90 percent of the opium into heroin and morphine before smuggling it around the world. AFP news agency quotes UNODC officials as saying in Kabul that until two years ago, Afghanistan exported almost exclusively raw opium.

The report says that even if the outlook in Afghanistan is bleak, there has been success in curbing opium production in the so-called Golden Triangle, where Myanmar, Thailand, and Laos meet. There, the cultivation of poppies has fallen by almost 80 percent in the last decade.

EurasiaNet Eurasia Insight - Afghan Opium Production Soars By Half In 2006