If one goes by the American standards, the saying is that they do not start a venture unless they are sure that it will be beneficial to them in the long run. They had eyed the Iraq oil field and have now ventured in Afghanistan for its thriving drug mafia. It is now an open secret and everyone knows who is behind the largest global smuggling of narcotics and weapons in the world. Dig just a little and you’ll find the American CIA’ hand. There are certain local aides who act as the frontmen for CIA. It is quite obvious who urged and supported the Afghans to restart growing poppy after the fall of the Taliban regime. The American intelligence is known for continuously playing dirty games in the South American countries, which are considered as havens for production and trade of narcotics.
No one can judge as the Americans fund Pakistan’s Anti-Narcotics Force, coupled with diplomatic pressures, to stop drug trafficking in the country, but when it comes to ISAF and the government in Kabul, the story is very different. The fact that poppy cultivation in Afghanistan has increased and its income is being utilized by terrorists to buy weapons surprises many in the world.
Poppy cultivation increased in 28 of the country’s 32 provinces, today, between 90 to 95% of the world’s supply of opium comes from Afghanistan. This is despite Mr Karzai’ comprehensive National Drug Control Strategy for Afghanistan. This is despite a NATO drive, as reported in a recent New York Times report, to disrupt Afghanistan’s drug trade. The reason being cited is that NATO and ISAF member countries’ law at home do not allow the soldiers to carry out operations against the poppy cultivation, etc. The objections were raised despite an agreement that the alliance’s campaign in Afghanistan would be broadened to include attacks on narcotics facilities, traffickers, and middlemen and drug lords whose profits helped to finance insurgent groups but nothing has been done.
American policymakers and military officers used to say that it was critical to choke off the drug money that sustained the insurgency, much as they were working with Pakistan to “halt the use of its tribal areas as a haven by the Taliban and other antigovernment forces just across the border from Afghanistan.” So how come after twelve years of war there seems to be a tremendous increase in opium growth rather than decrease? Sometimes such theories make sense as most of the people in Pakistan were amazed at American interference in the region.
SHUMAILA RAJA,
Rawalpindi, September 10.