Middle East: US Troops, Iraqi Police Seize Marijuana Plants

US troops and Iraqi police seized and destroyed a bumper crop of marijuana plants last week, according to a report in Stars & Stripes. Based on a military press release, the report said soldiers from the 172nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, which has responsibility for most of northern Iraq, discovered the field in an unnamed location.

According to the military press release, the field contained "juvenile marijuana plants grown in a series of furrows. The owner claimed he was growing sesame." Police put the value of the field at $2 million. The crop was cut down and destroyed, and the man arrested.

While drug use and trafficking was rare under the repressive regime of Saddam Hussein, the chaos and violence into which the country has descended since the US invasion in 2003, has both increased drug use and made the country more attractive to smugglers. That is to be expected, complained Hamid Ghodse, head of the International Narcotics Control Board, the United Nations body charged with monitoring compliance with UN anti-drug treaties.

"Whether it is due to war or disaster, weakening of border controls and security infrastructure make countries into convenient logistic and transit points, not only for international terrorists and militants, but also for traffickers," Ghodse told the BBC in referring to Iraq last year.

"You cannot have peace, security and development without attending to drug control," Ghodse added, staying on point. But in Iraq, maybe we'd all be better off if everyone just smoked some herb and chilled out.