Afghanistan opium cultivation skyrockets

[ckramer]

Afghanistan - Afghanistan's world-leading opium cultivation rose a "staggering" 59 percent this year, the U.N. anti-drugs chief announced Saturday in urging the government to crack down on big traffickers and remove corrupt officials and police.

The record crop yielded 6,100 tons of opium, or enough to make 610 tons of heroin — outstripping the demand of the world's heroin users by a third, according to U.N. figures.

Officials warned that the illicit trade is undermining the Afghan government, which is under attack by Islamic militants that a U.S.-led offensive helped drive from power in late 2001 for harboring Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida bases.

"The news is very bad. On the opium front today in some of the provinces of Afghanistan, we face a state of emergency," Antonio Maria Costa, chief of the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime, said at a news conference. "In the southern provinces, the situation is out of control."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060903/ap_on_re_as/afghan_drugs

[pinto]

1. The poppy trade in Afghanistan's gonna break whatever we

are supposedly doing there. Unless Bushco gets a grip and admits it's about law enforcement and not an idealogical military campaign, we're not going to make much headway, imho.

Remember, we sent in troops to break the Taliban cover and root out Osama bin Laden.

Almost happened.

Five years later and we're back to the drug trade.

This is news?

[pinto]

3. To clarify. I feel we are no longer in Afghanistan to find bin Laden

We're there because we're there. That's what Bushco's "stay the course" is about in the short term.

Long term is another set of circumstances, which is referred to as "spreading democracy".

I don't buy it, nor does most of the American public. We *all* know it's rhetoric.

Somebody's got to step up to the plate and call the game for what it is.

[awoke_in_2003]

7. we are also there

to protect that new pipeline to the Caspian.

[Bozita]

2. The "War on Drugs" meets the "War on Terrorism" -- Who's gonna win?

My money's on the drugs.

Nice to know the US can't lose since it's funding both sides.

[pinto]

5. They're both pipe dreams. I'd bet funding goes to the drug war

long after the war on terrorism takes its place beside the domino theory.

[UpInArms]

4. Can we have our $43 million back now?

Bush's Faustian Deal With the Taliban

Published May 22, 2001 in the Los Angeles Times

Enslave your girls and women, harbor anti-U.S. terrorists, destroy every vestige of civilization in your homeland, and the Bush administration will embrace you. All that matters is that you line up as an ally in the drug war, the only international cause that this nation still takes seriously.

That's the message sent with the recent gift of $43 million to the Taliban rulers of Afghanistan, the most virulent anti-American violators of human rights in the world today. The gift, announced last Thursday by Secretary of State Colin Powell, in addition to other recent aid, makes the U.S. the main sponsor of the Taliban and rewards that "rogue regime" for declaring that opium growing is against the will of God. So, too, by the Taliban's estimation, are most human activities, but it's the ban on drugs that catches this administration's attention.

Never mind that Osama bin Laden still operates the leading anti-American terror operation from his base in Afghanistan, from which, among other crimes, he launched two bloody attacks on American embassies in Africa in 1998.

Sadly, the Bush administration is cozying up to the Taliban regime at a time when the United Nations, at U.S. insistence, imposes sanctions on Afghanistan because the Kabul government will not turn over Bin Laden.

The war on drugs has become our own fanatics' obsession and easily trumps all other concerns. How else could we come to reward the Taliban, who has subjected the female half of the Afghan population to a continual reign of terror in a country once considered enlightened in its treatment of women?

...more...

(edited to add publication date)

[Bozita]

6. Could some of that $$$ have been used to finance 9/11?

It fits very nicely into the timeline.

[UpInArms]

8. I've wondered that very same thing many times

because it was not given as aid - it was a check delivered by Powell - cash - cold hard cash - not tied to any performance or given for anything specific.

Inquiring minds and all that.

:hi:

[Frank Cannon]

9. I've thought about that since 9/11 happened

All of the circumstances about that $43 million dollar gift are highly suspicious. I remember when we gave the Taliban that check that it seemed to make no sense at all.

Then 9/11 happened.

It doesn't take much to connect the dots, really.

[ShortnFiery]

10. What happened to the war on drugs? eom