Afghanistan is still the largest supplier of the world’s heroin and its illicit drug trade poses the gravest threat to the country’s long-term security, development and effective governance, particularly since Taliban mi

Fewer poppies, but Taliban still profits

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) annual opium survey shows that Afghanistan’s opium cultivation so far this year has dropped by 19% from 2007, and that of the 34 provinces, 18 were poppy free compared to 13 the previous year.

The severe drought and the strong leadership of local governors are the biggest factors contributing to this success.

According to the UNODC, drug cultivation, production and trafficking are carried out on a huge scale due to collaboration between corrupt officials, landowners, warlords and criminals. Ninety-eight percent of all Afghanistan’s opium is grown in the south-west where there are permanent Taliban settlements, and organised crime groups profit from the instability.

Real traffickers not in Afghanistan

Eighteen tonnes of heroin from Afghanistan end up in Russia alone each year. The drug mafia doesn’t recognise any borders in the world and wherever they find a country which is vulnerable and has a demand for narcotics, they will supply it.

“It means someone in Russia wants it,” said Zulmai Afzali, Ministry of Counter-Narcotics spokesperson.

Local smugglers in Afghanistan have decreased, but they have connections with the international mafia and it is difficult for the Afghan government to destroy this link.

“I reject the term narco terrorism,” said Afzali. “It is terrorism and the feeding tube is drug trafficking. Our government is dealing with the world’s worst mafia. The real traffickers don’t exist in Afghanistan. They are outside our borders and have their own routes – routes which were established during the 30 years of war in Afghanistan.”

Insecure borders

Afghanistan’s borders are massive, complex in terrain and expensive to patrol. Limited areas are patrolled officially by the Afghan military and NATO due to lack of adequate financial funds and manpower, which leaves the door open for smugglers.

The security situation will not change overnight. NATO had approached Afghanistan as though it were a classic post-conflict peacekeeping operation confined to the country’s borders, whereas is was actually an insurgency that was a crossborder phenomenon, as the Taliban are also represented in the neighbouring countries.

The U.S. and NATO have failed to understand that the Taliban belong to neither Afghanistan or Pakistan, but are a lumpen population, the product of refugee camps, militarised madrassas and the lack of opportunities in the borderlands of Pakistan and Afghanistan.

General M. Daud Daud, Deputy Minister of Counter-Narcotics, said 85% of Afghanistan’s drugs are smuggled across the Iranian and Pakistani borders. “This year we’ve arrested 500 suspect traffickers and destroyed four networks and 19 heroin labs, despite the fact that we have problems with training, equipment and insecurity. Russia is very important to us. We need our neighbouring countries.”

Criminal Justice Task Force

After 30 years of war in Afghanistan it has been difficult to find people who can work intelligently in the system. In 2005 the Afghan government set up the swift acting Criminal Justice Task Force (CJTF) to investigate and prosecute serious drug-related offences.

“There are secret systems in all governments,” said the CJTF’s communications director, Sareer Barmak. “It is a big challenge to implement rule of law to eliminate Afghanistan’s shadow economy. Our prosecutors and judges receive top-up salaries from the international community to prevent corruption. Traffickers often demand our judges to be ”flexible."

Barmak did not deny rumours that Afghan governmental and security services officials are involved in drug trafficking.

“The Afghan government is working on a strategy to train officials to reject bribes and to increase the salaries of police officers and government officials. We are also catching the little fish involved with trafficking – colonels from different security forces – who can lead us to the big fish.”

AFP Photo / Shah Marai

NATO to attack heroin labs

Until now NATO’s International Security and Assistance Force (ISAF) has concentrated on eradicating poppy crops, rather than attacking heroin factories and distribution networks. NATO intervened only when a direct link could be found between drug trafficking and insurgency.

At a recent meeting in Budapest NATO had decided to allow ISAF to take on the drug traffickers who are fuelling the insurgency and destabilising Afghanistan. Such counter-narcotics operations have until now been carried out by Afghan forces. The U.S. wants more aggressive tactics against the opium trade.
 
According to NATO operations commander General John Craddock, the Afghan opium trade is bankrolling the Taliban insurgency to the amount of approximately $US 100 million a year.

Some NATO members have been wary of the anti-drug mission, fearing that any crackdown would prompt a violent backlash against allied troops, since most of the heroin labs remain confined to the south and south-west region dominated by a strong insurgency. The nature of attacks changed between 2007 and 2008. In 2007, the deaths of policemen and soldiers were the result of violence by farmers, whereas deaths in 2008 were the result of insurgent actions, including suicide attacks.

Hidden drugs

To win back Afghanistan several practical measures are needed. While Afghan opium cultivation and production are declining, the UNODC suggests that vast amounts of opium, heroin and morphine have been withheld from the market.

“When we have knowledge of one of these stockpiled hideouts, usually to be found in southern Afghanistan, we send Commando 333 (Afghan Special Narcotics Force) on a clampdown,” Barmak said.

The CJTF is also concerned about the heroin labs found in this region. “This suggests that Afghanistan now has the experience how to build and run a lab,” Barmak said. “Our neighbours are not helping us. They are sending chemicals to Afghanistan to process the vast amounts of opium hidden by the insurgents.”

International cooperation needed

Corruption and death will continue to plague Afghanistan until greater counter-narcotics cooperation between Iran, Pakistan, Central Asia and the Gulf can disrupt drug smuggling and money laundering.

“Every day NATO soldiers are dying because of terrorists’ bullets provided by drug traffickers, and farmers in southern Afghanistan are threatened by drug lords at gun point or family members are killed by them,” Afzali said. “The Ministry of Counter- Narcotics is doing everything possible to curb drug trafficking. Our police force and technology is under rehabilitation and our government is striving to accept responsibility when things go wrong.”

No Afghan police squads in Russia

In its struggle to weaken drug trafficking, the Afghan government has so far been unable to send police squads to Russia, although Russia is financing and conducting special training in drug trafficking for security officials within the framework of the Russia-NATO Council.

“There is no political motive behind this,” said Afzali, “And we have not rejected the offer. Bombs are exploding in the provinces all the time and we have scheduling problems with no staff to spare. We will commit in the future.”
 
Lizette Potgieter for RT from Kabul, Afghanistan