Opium prices soar $29 per pound in 2009 to $77 per pound in 2010

[Eckhart Tolle]

As opium prices soar and allies focus on Taliban, Afghan drug war stumbles

58 Comments  |  View All »


By Pamela Constable
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, January 14, 2011; 12:00 AM

KABUL - After several years of steady progress in curbing opium poppy cultivation and cracking down on drug smugglers, Afghan officials say the anti-drug campaign is flagging as opium prices soar, farmers are lured back to the lucrative crop and Afghanistan's Western allies focus more narrowly on defeating the Taliban.

That combination adds a potentially destabilizing factor to Afghanistan at a time when the United States is desperate to show progress in a war now into its 10th year. The country's Taliban insurgency and the drug trade flourish in the same lawless terrain, and are often mutually reinforcing. But Afghan officials say the opium problem is not receiving the focus it deserves from Western powers.

"The price of opium is now seven times higher than wheat, and there is a $58 billion demand for narcotics, so our farmers have no disincentive to cultivate poppy," said Mohammed Azhar, deputy minister for counternarcotics. "We have gotten a lot of help, but it is not enough. Afghanistan is still producing 85 percent of the opium in the world, and it is still a dark stain on our name."

International attention to Afghanistan's drug problem has waxed and waned over the course of the war, often as a result of shifts in Western priorities as elected governments have changed and conflict with Islamist insurgents has intensified.

In the first several years after the fall of the Taliban in late 2001, U.S.-led policy was military-driven and drugs were not seen as a critical issue. Poppy cultivation, once banned by the Taliban, surged. By 2004, the U.S. and British governments stepped in with programs to eradicate poppy, encourage farmers to grow other crops and train Afghan police and prosecutors in how to combat drug trafficking.

Those efforts met with mixed success. Afghanistan eliminated poppy cultivation in 20 of 34 provinces, but it continued to flourish in the south and west, where the insurgency was strongest. Anti-drug police arrested hundreds of smugglers, but few major traffickers were caught and some were released under high-level political pressure. Insecurity and Taliban threats made some alternative crop programs hard to carry out.


Now, Afghan officials say, the latest NATO push to wipe out the Taliban leadership and focus on military goals has once again led to a reduced international interest in the drug war.


CONTINUED:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/13/AR2011011306738.html

[Tsul777]

Now, Afghan officials say, the latest NATO push to wipe out the Taliban leadership and focus on military goals has once again led to a reduced international interest in the drug war.

"But we're really putting our backs into it Dave!"
"Well, we'll just have to hire more slaves goddamn it! I need more product!"

[Tokiem]

Searching for Osama Bin Laden
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZPql5bvasg

[Ruth]

From what I heard the Taliban was a REAL disincentive to opium production prior to the American invasion.  I think its one of the things that religous fundamentalists hate (drugs that is).

[chris jones]

Hi Ruth. Your right, The talliys were not fond of opium, nor addicts.
                           A  historical point of interest, the CIA ran opium during the Vietnam war, *the golden triangle.  Despite the fact there was a congressional investigation proving their guilt (winter soldiers), testimony in the numbers including an old friend of mine. In fact the congessional leaders agreed in full to the the CIA's guilt, (the evidence and testimony was confirmed without a shadow of a doubt).
  The Result, nothing was done, ZIP..I beleive its fair to assume nothing will come of this, $$$$$$$.

[larsonstdoc]

  Hey Chris.  Did you see the movie American Gangster?  One of the themes was about smuggling dope in the caskets of dead American soldiers.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0765429/synopsis

from the movie synopsis....


Frank makes a deal with his cousin to get heroin back to the U.S. by smuggling it in coffins of dead soldiers returning from Vietnam. He goes to Nam to talk to his future provider directly. Since there is no middle man, Frank can sell heroin cheaper than anyone else in New York; it is also pure heroin nicknamed blue magic.

[chris jones]

 larson, yup, saw the movie, it was Bangkok. Franks deal was similar to the CIA's, the only difference is he had to do it on a clandestine level, the Agency was covered, above the law.
 An old friend of mine, sgt paul withers, greern beret was transfered TDY to Laos, on paper it was mill inteligence, truth it was CIA. He was a full blown Military kid, he was nieve. He worked with the hills tribe opium trade, protection, payoffs and landing strip security-CIA. They had it down to a science, all kinds of $$$. Paul was stuck, couldn't just back out, his beleifs of the Gov were destroyed.
  He was wounded and discharged, he testified at *winter soldiers*, he knew the deal inside out.
He told me congress had evidence in the reams,they investigated all charges-all testimony and agreed conclusivley the CIA ran the dope.
  This guy-trafficer-Frank was competition, the true criminals are a monopoly of ELITES.