Country of flowering poppies
The revenues of the Afghan “collective farmers” exceed 3 billion dollars a year (10-15% of Afghanistan’s GDP). Opium poppy crop area in Afghanistan surpasses the area of coca plantations in Colombia, Peru and Bolivia, taken together. This year, according to the UN, a record drug harvest is expected in Afghanistan. This is not surprising: after all, 9 / 10 from all opium poppy comes from this country. If three years ago un celebratedthat poppies were grown in 14 in the Afghan regions from 34, then in 2013 their number is already 20. And all this despite the fact that opium poppy cultivation in Afghanistan is prohibited and must be punished by law.
New poppy crops, says Spiegel journalist Hasnain Kazim, they appear not only in the traditional places of opium poppy cultivation - in the south, but also in the north of the country, where it was not grown before. Despite the fact that the cultivation of opium poppy in the country is prohibited by law, the number of provinces in which this plant is cultivated is growing rapidly. Three years ago, the UN noted that poppy was grown in 14 regions from 34, and now their number is already 20. As the author notes, Afghanistan is still the world's largest opium producer: “With favorable weather conditions and the absence of pests, 90% of the entire opium poppy is shipped from Afghanistan.”
Jean-Luc Lemayo, head of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, says that by growing poppies, Afghan farmers “are trying to insure themselves against troubled times.” Many fear that after the Western military leaves the country, the country will plunge into chaos. Growing the opium poppy, the author explains, is the fastest way to make money: the price per kilogram comes to a thousand dollars. In addition, poppy buyers provide farmers with favorable conditions, crediting and giving them everything they need.
A new source of income, based on the production of narcotic drugs, has discovered the Taliban, which is experiencing financial difficulties, and was at first against drugs, summarizes Kazim. Militants of the organization either cultivate narcotic substances themselves or tax the crop collected by the peasants.
According to the expert of the Ruhr University in Bochum, Wilhelm Löwenstein, in the Afghan drug business nowadays, 10% of the population of Afghanistan, about 3 million, is working hard. The only way to cope with the production of drugs, according to the expert, is to encourage alternative sources of income, as is the case in Jalalabad, where farmers do not grow drugs, but produce rose oil worth thousands of dollars per liter for cosmetics companies from Germany. In fact, the German regrets, such examples are rare.
Ruhr specialist rights: examples are rare. While the "collective farm" poppy activity has long become widespread. It is precisely the mass character that explains the opium records set by Afghanistan.
Last channel report "RT" this is the topic of the day: “Opium replaced agriculture for the Afghans.”
Local farmers, previously grown cotton, are now sowing opium poppy fields. They say they have nowhere to go: there is a shortage of jobs in the country, and the maintenance of traditional agriculture is hardly profitable.
Farmer Hamidulla gave an interview to the BBC, in which he complained: “The price of cotton is very low. It does not cover production costs. ” Last year he was advised to sow cotton by British and American consultants. In the end, he almost did not gain. Another thing is the cultivation of opium poppy. The Afghan has already counted future incomes: he will earn ten times more from the sale of drug raw materials than from the cotton trade.
The basis of poppy farming in Afghanistan is Helmand Province. According to the forecast of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, in 2013, the volume of opium production will increase significantly here. More than 75 thousand hectares of land will be sown with poppy seeds. This is three times more than in 2006. Half of the raw opium exported by Afghanistan will be produced in this province.
RT also recalls that opium poppy was grown in Tahar and Nangarhar. Previously, "plantations" in these provinces have not been noticed.
Long ago, back in 2001, the “eminent” British Prime Minister T. Blair boastfully stated that the overthrow of the Taliban regime would allow the destruction of the drug structure of the republic.
But a year and a half ago, Viktor Ivanov, head of the Federal Drug Control Service of the Russian Federation summed up NATO activities in Afghanistan: “I would call three main results. The first is a phenomenal increase in drug production, more than 40 times, the second is the militarization of the region ... And the third result is a humanitarian catastrophe, political instability and expanded reproduction of the militants. ”
In just one last year, according to the data of the aforementioned report of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, on the Afghan fields Was collected 3,7 million tons of opium poppy. And last year, the number of poppy grown somewhat decreased - no, not because of the opposition of the NATO forces, but because of the bad weather and the disease that hit the plants. Afghan villagers significantly expanded poppy planted areas. Compared to 2011, they grew by almost 20% (from 131 thousand hectares to 154 thousand hectares).
On the "Military Review" it was reported that NATO in general has disowned the fight against drug trafficking in Afghanistan. ISAF fights terrorism, not drugs. “NATO is not responsible for the drug problem - in Russia, Afghanistan or Iran. The authorities of these countries and the relevant state structures are responsible for this, ”said Robert Pchel, director of the NATO Information Office in Moscow, in 2013 in February. Discussion Passed in Veliky Novgorod within the framework of the 8th Winter School of the CIRP on the theme “Partnership of Russia, the EU and NATO in the Baltic Sea Region: developing a strategic approach”. Pshel noted that "he does not say that NATO is acting in this direction very well." But he added: “The problem exists. But in this regard, to conclude that NATO is responsible for the fact that this problem exists - sorry. Because our young boys and girls are risking their lives for the security of Afghanistan, and it cannot be understood that they are responsible for the drug problem. ”
But the Western democratic press is sounding the alarm. According to UN experts, the drug trade from Afghanistan is the third largest in the world in terms of profitability after oil and oil weaponstransmits channel "Euronews".
Afghans say: “By growing wheat, we can hardly feed ourselves. About clothes and essentials and nothing to say! And for 4,5 kilograms of opium, you can bail out more than for 5 tons of wheat. ”
Well, and help out. And with them at the same time operate corrupt officials who make a profit from every kilogram of the drug.
The transportation of opium is almost officially established in Afghanistan.
At the end of January 2013, the US Army terminated a transport agreement with the Afghan airline Kam Air, reports "RT". "The United States will not conduct business with those who encourage illegal business," said Major General Richard Longo. “Kam Air is too big a company not to know what things are going on inside it.”
The representatives of the United States explained to the publication “The Wall Street Journal” that “Kam Air” was caught participating in the opium trade.
In response, there was an accusation of lying. The founder and current head of the airline Zamari Kamgar stated that he hopes to continue the contract with the US military: “I categorically deny all the charges. It is simply impossible to remove such cargo from the country, bypassing the Afghan customs. ” Kamgar added that the charges against his company were ... fabricated by competitors.
If this company transported opium to Russia, the Americans would probably not mind. But - to my native America ... Not all will be tolerated.
Russia is the main consumer of narcotics coming from Afghanistan. About it is known from the annual report on the world drug control situation, published by the US State Department in 2011. The State Department directly stated: “Russia is the main destination for heroin flows from Afghanistan and an important market for traders in opium, hashish, marijuana, synthetic drugs and other dangerous prohibited substances”. According to the UN Office on Drugs and Related Crime, cited in this report, Russians use 70 tons of heroin per year, and the number of its consumers in the country reached 1,6-1,8 million people, or 1,3% of the population. And among them, the number of people infected with HIV reached 61% in some regions.
In order to solve this terrible problem, the delegation of the Collective Security Treaty Organization plans to go to Afghanistan in the second half of 2013 to familiarize themselves with the situation. Such a decision was made on April 11 at a meeting of the CSTO Parliamentary Assembly Council held in St. Petersburg.
The proposal to travel to Afghanistan was received from State Duma Speaker Sergei Naryshkin. The initiative was announced after reports Rosbalt, as the Council heard a report on the situation in Afghanistan and comments from representatives of the CSTO member countries. CSTO Secretary General Nikolai Bordyuzha stressed that "the situation in Afghanistan continues to be a painful point." He was supported by representatives of the countries of Central Asia.
The speaker of the Kyrgyz parliament, Asilbek Jeenbekov, said: “Peaceful development in Afghanistan is impossible without stopping the cultivation of opium there. Where drugs are, there is terrorism, corruption, and crime. ” And he added that his country is an Afghan drug user. The Northern Route, the world's largest drug trafficking in the supply of opium from Afghanistan to Russia and Europe, passes through the territory of this state.
How local Afghan authorities are “fighting” drug dealerships can be found in reports, for example, on the website Afghanistan.ru. In April, on the territory of Lashkargah, the administrative center of Helmand province, Afghan police searched the house of a woman named Zarmin, accused of selling drugs. The head of the anti-drug department of the province, Mohammad Abdali, told the press that the purpose of the operation was to detain a female drug dealer, and only the latter somehow heard about the plans of the law enforcement agencies and disappeared. Following the operation, 15 people involved in transactions were arrested.
And here is the news from Mother Russia. Fortunately, the Russian drug police act much more professionally than the Afghan. As reported on April 18 GTRK Perm, on the Cosmonauts Highway in Perm, a special operation was carried out. Stopped "Volkswagen". His spare wheel was packed with heroin packs weighing 27 kilograms. On the thirteen packages there was a seal with the image of a horse and an Arabic inscription, on another fourteen a flying bird was painted and the date was “2012”. The examination confirmed that the whole drug is from Afghanistan, and it is of very high quality. Investigators believe that heroin was transported through Perm to Moscow.
Как reminded the other day, Viktor Ivanov, head of the Russian Federal Drug Control Service, since 2001, more than one million people in the world have died from using Afghan heroin. At a recent Moscow conference on the drug situation in Afghanistan, Comrade Ivanov said: “Since the beginning of the millennium, since the beginning of Operation Enduring Freedom in 2001, more than a million people have died from Afghan heroin, moreover, into transnational organized crime from heroin sales have invested over a trillion dollars. "
According to Ivanov, voiced by him earlier, up to 100 thousands of people die each year in Russia because of drugs. In June, 2012, he said that, according to the latest research conducted by the Federal Drug Control Service, drugs in Russia regularly or occasionally use 8,5 million people. At least once in a lifetime, drugs have tried 18,5 million Russian citizens.
By the way, the Afghans willy-nilly hooked on the needle. Writes Pravda.ru, Afghanistan has become not only the main global producer of opiates, but also their main consumer: out of 35 of millions of Afghans, more than a million people sit on heroin. Among the reasons for the increase in drug use are called war, unemployment, migration, and the easy availability of heroin.
Among the inhabitants of the country, about 40% are out of work. Heroin in Kabul is readily available. A gram of it costs about 6 dollars. In addition, drug addicted refugees from Iran and Pakistan are returning to the country.
Thus, Afghanistan has become not only a “world-wide” center for the production of drugs, but also a country where 3 percent of the population suffers from drug addiction. And the number of addicts is growing steadily.
New poppy crops, says Spiegel journalist Hasnain Kazim, they appear not only in the traditional places of opium poppy cultivation - in the south, but also in the north of the country, where it was not grown before. Despite the fact that the cultivation of opium poppy in the country is prohibited by law, the number of provinces in which this plant is cultivated is growing rapidly. Three years ago, the UN noted that poppy was grown in 14 regions from 34, and now their number is already 20. As the author notes, Afghanistan is still the world's largest opium producer: “With favorable weather conditions and the absence of pests, 90% of the entire opium poppy is shipped from Afghanistan.”
Jean-Luc Lemayo, head of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, says that by growing poppies, Afghan farmers “are trying to insure themselves against troubled times.” Many fear that after the Western military leaves the country, the country will plunge into chaos. Growing the opium poppy, the author explains, is the fastest way to make money: the price per kilogram comes to a thousand dollars. In addition, poppy buyers provide farmers with favorable conditions, crediting and giving them everything they need.
A new source of income, based on the production of narcotic drugs, has discovered the Taliban, which is experiencing financial difficulties, and was at first against drugs, summarizes Kazim. Militants of the organization either cultivate narcotic substances themselves or tax the crop collected by the peasants.
According to the expert of the Ruhr University in Bochum, Wilhelm Löwenstein, in the Afghan drug business nowadays, 10% of the population of Afghanistan, about 3 million, is working hard. The only way to cope with the production of drugs, according to the expert, is to encourage alternative sources of income, as is the case in Jalalabad, where farmers do not grow drugs, but produce rose oil worth thousands of dollars per liter for cosmetics companies from Germany. In fact, the German regrets, such examples are rare.
Ruhr specialist rights: examples are rare. While the "collective farm" poppy activity has long become widespread. It is precisely the mass character that explains the opium records set by Afghanistan.
Last channel report "RT" this is the topic of the day: “Opium replaced agriculture for the Afghans.”
Local farmers, previously grown cotton, are now sowing opium poppy fields. They say they have nowhere to go: there is a shortage of jobs in the country, and the maintenance of traditional agriculture is hardly profitable.
Farmer Hamidulla gave an interview to the BBC, in which he complained: “The price of cotton is very low. It does not cover production costs. ” Last year he was advised to sow cotton by British and American consultants. In the end, he almost did not gain. Another thing is the cultivation of opium poppy. The Afghan has already counted future incomes: he will earn ten times more from the sale of drug raw materials than from the cotton trade.
The basis of poppy farming in Afghanistan is Helmand Province. According to the forecast of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, in 2013, the volume of opium production will increase significantly here. More than 75 thousand hectares of land will be sown with poppy seeds. This is three times more than in 2006. Half of the raw opium exported by Afghanistan will be produced in this province.
RT also recalls that opium poppy was grown in Tahar and Nangarhar. Previously, "plantations" in these provinces have not been noticed.
Long ago, back in 2001, the “eminent” British Prime Minister T. Blair boastfully stated that the overthrow of the Taliban regime would allow the destruction of the drug structure of the republic.
But a year and a half ago, Viktor Ivanov, head of the Federal Drug Control Service of the Russian Federation summed up NATO activities in Afghanistan: “I would call three main results. The first is a phenomenal increase in drug production, more than 40 times, the second is the militarization of the region ... And the third result is a humanitarian catastrophe, political instability and expanded reproduction of the militants. ”
In just one last year, according to the data of the aforementioned report of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, on the Afghan fields Was collected 3,7 million tons of opium poppy. And last year, the number of poppy grown somewhat decreased - no, not because of the opposition of the NATO forces, but because of the bad weather and the disease that hit the plants. Afghan villagers significantly expanded poppy planted areas. Compared to 2011, they grew by almost 20% (from 131 thousand hectares to 154 thousand hectares).
On the "Military Review" it was reported that NATO in general has disowned the fight against drug trafficking in Afghanistan. ISAF fights terrorism, not drugs. “NATO is not responsible for the drug problem - in Russia, Afghanistan or Iran. The authorities of these countries and the relevant state structures are responsible for this, ”said Robert Pchel, director of the NATO Information Office in Moscow, in 2013 in February. Discussion Passed in Veliky Novgorod within the framework of the 8th Winter School of the CIRP on the theme “Partnership of Russia, the EU and NATO in the Baltic Sea Region: developing a strategic approach”. Pshel noted that "he does not say that NATO is acting in this direction very well." But he added: “The problem exists. But in this regard, to conclude that NATO is responsible for the fact that this problem exists - sorry. Because our young boys and girls are risking their lives for the security of Afghanistan, and it cannot be understood that they are responsible for the drug problem. ”
But the Western democratic press is sounding the alarm. According to UN experts, the drug trade from Afghanistan is the third largest in the world in terms of profitability after oil and oil weaponstransmits channel "Euronews".
“The situation is very alarming. Black market monitoring shows that opium production is steadily increasing. If comprehensive measures are not taken, Afghanistan will gradually turn into a narco-state. ”
Afghans say: “By growing wheat, we can hardly feed ourselves. About clothes and essentials and nothing to say! And for 4,5 kilograms of opium, you can bail out more than for 5 tons of wheat. ”
Well, and help out. And with them at the same time operate corrupt officials who make a profit from every kilogram of the drug.
The transportation of opium is almost officially established in Afghanistan.
At the end of January 2013, the US Army terminated a transport agreement with the Afghan airline Kam Air, reports "RT". "The United States will not conduct business with those who encourage illegal business," said Major General Richard Longo. “Kam Air is too big a company not to know what things are going on inside it.”
The representatives of the United States explained to the publication “The Wall Street Journal” that “Kam Air” was caught participating in the opium trade.
In response, there was an accusation of lying. The founder and current head of the airline Zamari Kamgar stated that he hopes to continue the contract with the US military: “I categorically deny all the charges. It is simply impossible to remove such cargo from the country, bypassing the Afghan customs. ” Kamgar added that the charges against his company were ... fabricated by competitors.
If this company transported opium to Russia, the Americans would probably not mind. But - to my native America ... Not all will be tolerated.
Russia is the main consumer of narcotics coming from Afghanistan. About it is known from the annual report on the world drug control situation, published by the US State Department in 2011. The State Department directly stated: “Russia is the main destination for heroin flows from Afghanistan and an important market for traders in opium, hashish, marijuana, synthetic drugs and other dangerous prohibited substances”. According to the UN Office on Drugs and Related Crime, cited in this report, Russians use 70 tons of heroin per year, and the number of its consumers in the country reached 1,6-1,8 million people, or 1,3% of the population. And among them, the number of people infected with HIV reached 61% in some regions.
In order to solve this terrible problem, the delegation of the Collective Security Treaty Organization plans to go to Afghanistan in the second half of 2013 to familiarize themselves with the situation. Such a decision was made on April 11 at a meeting of the CSTO Parliamentary Assembly Council held in St. Petersburg.
The proposal to travel to Afghanistan was received from State Duma Speaker Sergei Naryshkin. The initiative was announced after reports Rosbalt, as the Council heard a report on the situation in Afghanistan and comments from representatives of the CSTO member countries. CSTO Secretary General Nikolai Bordyuzha stressed that "the situation in Afghanistan continues to be a painful point." He was supported by representatives of the countries of Central Asia.
The speaker of the Kyrgyz parliament, Asilbek Jeenbekov, said: “Peaceful development in Afghanistan is impossible without stopping the cultivation of opium there. Where drugs are, there is terrorism, corruption, and crime. ” And he added that his country is an Afghan drug user. The Northern Route, the world's largest drug trafficking in the supply of opium from Afghanistan to Russia and Europe, passes through the territory of this state.
How local Afghan authorities are “fighting” drug dealerships can be found in reports, for example, on the website Afghanistan.ru. In April, on the territory of Lashkargah, the administrative center of Helmand province, Afghan police searched the house of a woman named Zarmin, accused of selling drugs. The head of the anti-drug department of the province, Mohammad Abdali, told the press that the purpose of the operation was to detain a female drug dealer, and only the latter somehow heard about the plans of the law enforcement agencies and disappeared. Following the operation, 15 people involved in transactions were arrested.
And here is the news from Mother Russia. Fortunately, the Russian drug police act much more professionally than the Afghan. As reported on April 18 GTRK Perm, on the Cosmonauts Highway in Perm, a special operation was carried out. Stopped "Volkswagen". His spare wheel was packed with heroin packs weighing 27 kilograms. On the thirteen packages there was a seal with the image of a horse and an Arabic inscription, on another fourteen a flying bird was painted and the date was “2012”. The examination confirmed that the whole drug is from Afghanistan, and it is of very high quality. Investigators believe that heroin was transported through Perm to Moscow.
Как reminded the other day, Viktor Ivanov, head of the Russian Federal Drug Control Service, since 2001, more than one million people in the world have died from using Afghan heroin. At a recent Moscow conference on the drug situation in Afghanistan, Comrade Ivanov said: “Since the beginning of the millennium, since the beginning of Operation Enduring Freedom in 2001, more than a million people have died from Afghan heroin, moreover, into transnational organized crime from heroin sales have invested over a trillion dollars. "
According to Ivanov, voiced by him earlier, up to 100 thousands of people die each year in Russia because of drugs. In June, 2012, he said that, according to the latest research conducted by the Federal Drug Control Service, drugs in Russia regularly or occasionally use 8,5 million people. At least once in a lifetime, drugs have tried 18,5 million Russian citizens.
By the way, the Afghans willy-nilly hooked on the needle. Writes Pravda.ru, Afghanistan has become not only the main global producer of opiates, but also their main consumer: out of 35 of millions of Afghans, more than a million people sit on heroin. Among the reasons for the increase in drug use are called war, unemployment, migration, and the easy availability of heroin.
Among the inhabitants of the country, about 40% are out of work. Heroin in Kabul is readily available. A gram of it costs about 6 dollars. In addition, drug addicted refugees from Iran and Pakistan are returning to the country.
Thus, Afghanistan has become not only a “world-wide” center for the production of drugs, but also a country where 3 percent of the population suffers from drug addiction. And the number of addicts is growing steadily.
Observed and commented on Oleg Chuvakin
- especially for topwar.ru
- especially for topwar.ru
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