Talking to reporters in Kabul on July 28, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC)'s country representative Christina Oguz has said it is not correct to blame Afghanistan alone for the heroin problem in the world. Her argument was that even though over 93 percent of the world's opium supply is produced in Afghanistan and an estimated 60 percent of that was converted into heroin within that country last year, the chemicals used for this conversion process are produced by other countries. I think she should have gone a step further and said the actual culprits are the drug addicts in Europe and USA who pay astronomical prices for the drug creating this huge demand that impels production. Ms Oguz also stated that powerful drug-lords were managing to escape justice merely by making a telephone call to senior authorities in the Afghan government. Again, Afghan government cannot, perhaps, be faulted. It is, after all, a mere puppet. The real power, Ms Oguz knows, lies elsewhere and so does the responsibility. -S.R.H. HASHMI, Karachi, via e-mail, July 31.