Australian:
TALIBAN insurgents in Afghanistan have formed Colombian-style drug cartels that sell opium to fund the bloody nine-year insurgency, according to a leaked US diplomatic cable.
Released by website whistleblower WikiLeaks, the 2009 cable rejects the popular notion that poverty forces Afghan farmers into opium production.
A September 2009 briefing by the UN Office of Drugs and Crime (UNODC) at NATO headquarters was told that the main factor driving Afghan opium production was coercion of local farmers by Taliban insurgents.
According to UNODC executive director, Antonio Costa, opium production declined 22 per cent in 2009 to its lowest level in 15 years, with the industry centred almost entirely in the war-ravaged south.
Mr Costa said International Security Assistance Force counter-narcotics operations did play a role and were a reinforcing trend (in curtailing opium production), but not as strong as the severity of the insurgency and the coercion of farmers to grow illicit crops.
“Farmers acknowledged that opium was more profitable than licit crops,” he said.
“On the other hand, he said farmers also feared law enforcement retaliation for growing it and, thus, actually viewed it as less profitable overall,” the cable quoted Mr Costa as saying.
The most worrying revelation concerned the formation by the Taliban of Colombian-style drug cartels, revealed in interviews with former Taliban detainees, he said.
“There was evidence of emerging narco-cartels along Afghanistan's southern border that are linked to the Taliban.
“ Many former Taliban detainees said that their sleeping bags were often bags of opium,” the cable said.
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This suggest to me the new counterinsurgency effort can be an effective way to defund the Taliban by protecting the farmers and allowing them to grow legitimate crops. This looks more like an opportunity than a long term problem if we do a good job of protecting the people.
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