News from the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA)
RAWA News
News from the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA)
RAWA News


 

 

 





 


 


Help RAWA: Order from our wish list on Amazon.com

RAWA Channel on Youtube

Follow RAWA on Twitter

Join RAWA on Facebook



The Jerusalem Post, July 17, 2007

Afghanistan to break opium poppy growing record

Afghan farmers harvested 185,000 hectares (457,135 acres) of poppies this year

Afghanistan's illicit heroin-producing poppy crop set another record this growing season, besting even last year's haul despite stepped-up efforts to combat the trade, the top US official in Afghanistan said Tuesday.

Opium in Afghanistan
The list of those suspected of involvement in the drug trade reaches high into Karzai's government.
Los Angeles Times, May 29, 2005

Ambassador William Wood said preliminary data show that Afghan farmers harvested 185,000 hectares (457,135 acres) of poppies this year, continuing the upward trend of an industry fueling the Taliban, crime, drug addiction, and government corruption. Farmers last year grew 165,000 hectares (407,715 acres).

Farmers this year grew 86,000 hectares (212,506 acres) in Helmand province alone, the most violent region in Afghanistan where NATO forces are battling hundreds or thousands of Taliban fighters. Government-led eradication efforts destroyed about 20,000 hectares (49,420 acres) of poppies this year, Wood said.

"Our eradication effort ... was disappointing," Wood told reporters at his private residence overlooking Kabul. - AP

Category: Drugs - Views: 15185



Latest

Most Viewed