AFGHANISTAN: Britain boosts counter-narcotics efforts

[ This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]

KABUL, 8 Dec 2004 (IRIN) - Surrounded by tens of armed security guards, Bill Rammell, UK Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, set alight a pile of narcotics on the outskirts of the capital, Kabul, on Monday.

The narcotics had been seized by the newly established UK-backed Counter-Narcotics Police of Afghanistan (CNPA) in several operations around Kabul recently.

Following the UN warnings that Afghanistan could fall into the death grip of drug gangs fueled by the burgeoning opium poppy crop, the UK, the US and the Afghan government are pushing the fight to control the multi-billion dollar drug trade in the post-conflict country.

One day prior to the inauguration of Afghanistan’s elected president, Hamid Karzai, Rammell, the British Member of Parliament (MP), who had come to attend the inauguration ceremony, said they would use all possible elements to fight the drugs problem in Afghanistan.

Rammell’s mission came almost few weeks after a report by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) that indicated a massive increase in opium poppy cultivation in the Central Asian nation in 2004.

According to UNODC, Afghan opium poppy cultivation has spread to all the 32 provinces of the country and in 2004 the booming trade was equal to 30 to 50 percent of the country’s GDP, with US $2.8 billion revenue. The report also showed that Afghanistan provided 87 percent of the world’s illicit opium output with 4,200 mt of opium this year.

The news worried the international community - mainly the UK as the lead nation in the Afghan counter-narcotics programme.

“We expect to see a turning in the tide at the end of the next planting season and when you see the next UNODC report [at the end of 2005] we would expect to see a reduction by that stage,” Rammel told IRIN.

He also called on the international community to rally behind Afghanistan in the fight against drugs.

Meanwhile, Afghanistan’s newly elected President, in his inaugural address in Kabul, underscored the urgency of the fight against opium poppy while high-ranking delegates from nearly 50 countries, including the US Vice-President Dick Cheney, attended the ceremony.

As the first task after being elected, Karzai is convening a meeting of tribal leaders from across the nation to confront the issue on Thursday.

“The fact that he [Hamid Karzai] is calling this extra-ordinary conference this week on counter-narcotics is sending out a very strong message to all the local leaders that drug cultivation is unacceptable, it is illegal and very strong action will be taken against them,” Rammel said. “All of that gives me reasonable confidence.”

The MP said the next planting season, which is now beginning and will carry through to May was “the real test” to see if their strategy would work. “Because this is the first time, all the different elements of the strategy have been in place for the full planting season. And that is why I am reasonably confident.”

The minister also informed of a recent shift in policy of the nearly 20,000 US-led Coalition troops and the 6,000 NATO-led international peacekeepers (ISAF) who would be involved in tackling the drugs problem.

“We are saying that on an opportunistic basis as they come across drug laboratories that they destroy them and when they come across personnel who are involved in illegal activities associated with that [drugs], they take them prisoners,” he maintained.

Recently, Washington announced a major new offensive against drug production in Afghanistan. Washington expects to spend an extra $780 million in the next financial year on measures including eradication of poppy fields and providing alternative livelihoods for farmers.

Meanwhile, the UK government is expecting to spend some $960 million over five years on the Afghan counter-narcotics efforts until 2007. “We have been calling upon all the international partners to do more in terms of financial and material commitment towards the drug challenge,” Rammell noted.

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