Karzai targets Afghan drugs trade

Many of those involved in the trade will meet Karzai to

thrash out their concerns.

They are certain to 

discuss the thorny problem of forcing 2.3 million Afghan farmers to

take a huge cut in income if they are to give up poppy cultivation.

"Our principal promises concern the strengthening of the security sector and ensuring lasting stability throughout the country, the elimination of poppy cultivation and the fight against the processing and trafficking of drugs," Karzai told assembled Afghan dignitaries at his inauguration on Tuesday.

Afghanistan is now the source of 87% of the world's opium and the origin of 90% of the heroin on the streets of Europe, according to a recent report by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).

Poppy cultivation is the main engine of Afghanistan's

economic growth - producing 60% of GDP - and binds together

previously quarrelsome local communities, the report said.

Lucrative trade

Reversing the tide will not be easy.

Opium cultivation has surged 64% in the past year

"There are warlords involved, high government officials, police

commanders, governors are involved.

"We have to reform our judicial

system and put big culprits behind bars, otherwise going after poor

farmers we will fill our prisons but still the drug business will be

going on," Mirwais Yasini, head of Afghanistan's Counter-Narcotics

Directorate said last month.

Opium cultivation has surged more than 64% over the last

year according to the UNODC, but for ordinary farmers it has meant

food on the table and the chance for their children to get an

education.

After 25 years of war, Afghanistan has no infrastructure to

transport goods to market and farmers can earn over 10 times more

growing opium than cultivating fruit, vegetables or other cash

crops.

"There are amazing parallels with Colombia and Bolivia where

ordinary farmers are forced into growing opium or coca because there

is no economic alternative," said a Westerner working on counter-

narcotics in Kabul.

Instability

After this year's surge in production, the US has

finally got tough and earmarked $780 million to combat

narcotics in Afghanistan over the next year.

This comes after three years of

focusing on fighting the Taliban in the country's troubled south.

However, only around $120 million of that sum will be

funnelled into providing alternative livelihoods for farmers and

widespread eradication could lead to instability if not managed

properly.

With parliamentary elections scheduled for early next year, there

are fears that local rivalries could flare into violence.

If the parliamentary elections are to go successfully, both "the

Afghan government and the international community need to put in

more resources and make more progress in the next few months on

improving security, cutting down the power of the warlords and

attacking the spreading influence of the drugs trade", said a report

by the Brussels-based International Crisis Group.