- (Reuters) -- Poppy cultivation in Afghanistan doubled
between 2002 and 2003 to a level 36 times higher than in the last year
of rule by the Taliban.
-
- The Taliban was cracking down on poppy production in
the year before the US military drove the movement out of office in late
2001 in response to its friendship and cooperation with the Al Qaeda and
Osama bin Laden.
-
- The new Afghan Government, led by President Hamid Karzai,
has not been able to impose its will in many areas of the country, which
remain under the control of warlords.
-
- The White House statement said, "A challenging security
situation... has complicated significantly the task of implementing counter-narcotics
assistance programs and will continue to do so for the immediate future".
-
- "Poppy cultivation in Afghanistan is a major and
growing problem. Drug cultivation and trafficking are undermining the rule
of law and putting money in the pocket of terrorists," it said, quoting
office director John Walters.
-
- The area planted with poppies, used to make heroin and
morphine, was 61,000 hectares in 2003, compared with 30,700 hectares in
2002 and 1,685 hectares in 2001, the White House Office of National Drug
Control Policy said in a statement.
-
- The US figures differ significantly from those released
a month ago by the United Nations, which estimated that poppy cultivation
rose 8 percent in 2003, to 80,000 hectares from 74,000 hectares in 2002.
-
- The White House said the United Nations used a different
method, based a mixture of ground surveys and analysis of imagery from
commercial satellites.
-
- The US estimates are based on a sample survey of Afghan
agricultural regions conducted with specialised government satellite imaging
systems, it said.
-
- http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/s1000068.htm
|
