Mission & Justice

James Emery; 6/5/08

According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), the export value of Afghanistan’s opium production was about $4 billion last year, of which 24 percent went to those working at the lower to middle end of the opium chain. The bulk of the money goes to regional and international trafficking organizations that have ties with the Taliban, terrorists, and multinational criminal organizations. “Counter-narcotics is one of the key challenges,” said Ashraf Haidari, political counselor at the Embassy of Afghanistan in Washington, D.C. “I think that unless we resolve the narcotics problem, it can undo many of our achievements, especially the governance and the rule of law. Narcotics traders are corrupting everyone that is not paid well; the police primarily, but also the judicial system up to institutions that constitute the face of the government.”

See: http://www.metimes.com/International/2008/05/06/winning_the_ afghan_opium_war/4967/
(This is part seven of an eight-part series.)
See part one at - Afghanistan’s opium dilemma
See part two at - The Taliban opium connection
See part three at - Afghan opium – The farmer’s perspective
See part four at - Afghan drugs and regional addiction rates
See part five at - Afghanistan’s myriad drug smuggling routes
See part six at - Converting Afghan opium into heroin

Tags: Afghanistan, DrugsAdd new tag, Terrorism, USA

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 7th, 2008 at 4:24 pm and is filed under Afghanistan, Drugs, Human Rights, Terrorism, USA. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.