|
Southwest
Asia:
Afghan
Eradication
Campaign
Takes
Deadly
Turn
5/12/06
https://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle-old/435/afghanopium.shtml
The Afghan government's effort
to eradicate opium poppies provoked deadly violence Tuesday as angry farmers
clashed with anti-drug agents trying to chop down poppy fields. Two
farmers were killed and nine policemen wounded after shooting broke out
when farmers in the fields harvesting the poppies confronted the eradicators.
|
 |
| |
incised papaver specimens (opium poppies) |
Afghanistan produces about
90% of the world's opium, from which heroin can be refined. According
to the United Nations, the crop brings about $600 million a year to Afghan
farmers (and $2.1 billion to smugglers and traffickers), and opium accounts
for more than one-third of Afghanistan's Gross National Product.
It also provides a living for hundreds of thousands of Afghans and their
families.
Under pressure from the West,
particularly Britain and the United States, the government of President
Hamid Karzai has declared a jihad against opium, but the government's efforts
are hampered by its weakness, its infiltration by drug trafficking interests,
and its awareness that too aggressive an eradication campaign could benefit
a reinvigorated Taliban, which has promised to protect opium farmers in
the south. The Karzai government is undertaking only limited eradication
efforts and has rejected the use of aerial eradication.
Tuesday's violence, the most
serious so far this year, occurred in the province of Sar-i-Pul in the
north. "Police faced resistance from armed people among the farmers,"
provincial police chief General Nadir Fahimi told Reuters. "Two farmers
were killed while nine policemen were wounded, three of them critically,"
he said.
-- END --
|
Issue #435
-- 5/12/06
Editorial:
Another
Spectacle
of
Unreason
in
the
Drug
War
|
Feature:
DEA
Montreal
Confab
Greeted
by
Counter-Conference
|
Feature:
"2020
Group"
Begins
Building
an
International
Drug
Reform
Movement
|
Feature:
Marijuana
Activists
Take
to
Streets
for
Annual
Global
Marijuana
March
|
Offer
and
Appeal:
Important
New
Legalization
Video
and
Drug
War
Facts
Book
Available
|
Feedback:
Do
You
Read
Drug
War
Chronicle?
|
This
Week's
Corrupt
Cops
Stories
|
Politics:
Albany
DA
Ignites
Firestorm
By
Calling
Drug
War
"Lucrative"
|
Sentencing:
New
York
Assembly
Passes
Rockefeller
Law
Reform
Bill
|
Marijuana:
In
Reversal,
Alaska
House
Passes
Recriminalization
Bill
|
South
Asia:
India
Supreme
Court
Says
Time
to
Prohibit
Alcohol
|
Southwest
Asia:
Afghan
Eradication
Campaign
Takes
Deadly
Turn
|
Web
Scan:
Buffalo
Legalization
Talk
--
Twice,
Flash
Animation
on
Two
Years
for
One
Joint,
Cannabinoid
Chronicles,
U-Mass
v.
DEA,
World
Prison
Populations
|
Weekly:
This
Week
in
History
|
Job
Opportunity:
Office
Administrator/Book-keeper,
MPP,
Washington
|
Part-Time
Job
Opportunity:
Cannabis
Action
Network,
Berkeley,
California
|
Weekly:
The
Reformer's
Calendar
|
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