UN warns of Afghan drug war in 2015

Simultaneously with World Drug Day being observed, the United Nations warned that Afghanistan will witness a high increase in cultivation and production of narcotics in the current year.

Afghan poppy fields covered some 224,000 hectares (553,500 acres) in 2014 — a seven-percent rise from the 209,000 hectares the previous year, according to a new study by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).

The narcotics trade has been a financial boon for the insurgency in Afghanistan, a country that is responsible for more than 80 percent of the world’s opium supply. The nexus between drug profits and terrorism funding means that opium trafficking is more than just an Afghan problem — it’s an international security threat.

UNODC’s annual World Drug Report showed that Afghanistan accounts for about 85 percent of opium production and 77 percent of worldwide heroin production.

Estimated global production of opiates meanwhile doubled in two years from 3,700 tons in 2012 to 7,554 tons in 2014.

Meanwhile, a number of parliament members have said that the poppy cultivation has resumed in some of the provinces.

“If insecurity rise we will have a bad year in terms of the drugs,” Hashim Wahdat Yar, head of regional cooperation of UN counter narcotics said.

At the same time, the minister of counter narcotics has also voiced concern over increasing poppy cultivation; adding insecurity, regional causes and agricultural productions not mechanized are the main reason for the increase of drugs.

Reported by Ahmad Farshad Saleh