Afghan drug production - greater threat to peace than terrorism.

KABUL, September 5 (Itar-Tass) -- The drug production in Kabul is a
threat to peace and security, probably even a greater threat than modern
terrorism, the chief of the Russian State Anti-Drug Committee and the
director of the Federal Service for Control of Drugs and Psychotropic
Substances Circulation, Viktor Ivanov, told Russian reporters upon arrival
in Kabul on Sunday.
A major group of drug police officers arrived in Kabul to attend the
second regional anti-drug conference between Russia, Afghanistan, Pakistan
and Tajikistan (the Central Asian anti-drug quartet).
The participants in the conference "intend to discuss in earnest the
heroin production situation in Afghanistan and to pool efforts in the
struggle with this evil," Ivanov noted. About 90 officers from the drug
watchdogs of several countries and high-ranking UN, NATO officials and
ambassadors from several countries accredited in Afghanistan will
participate in the conference.
Ivanov also noted that "a behind-closed-doors round of discussions
will be held on Monday morning to exchange opinions on the measures
proposed to step up the struggle against the drug production in
Afghanistan." "Then several bilateral meetings will be held and I will
meet with the leadership of the Afghan Drug Control Ministry," Ivanov
noted.
"Russia is deeply interested to build up the struggle against the drug
production in this country, because Russia is not only an Afghan heroin
consuming country, but also a distributing country due to some
circumstances," he pointed out.
"Russia is unfortunately ranked second after Europe in the consumption
of heroin delivered to our country from Afghanistan," Ivanov stressed.
"This happens due to the geographic vacuum, which has formed between the
borders of Afghanistan and Russia due to underdeveloped borders after the
collapse of the Soviet Union," he elaborated.
"Russia traffics 10 billion doses of Afghan heroin annually. Some 150
billion doses of this evil are annually produced and stocked in
Afghanistan," Ivanov noted, adding that "some 16 million Afghan heroin
addicts number in the world, including two million heroin addicts in
Russia."
"For Afghan drug barons, which gain enormous profits from the
production and distribution of this poison, this is a very profitable
business, which flourishes amid a harsh poverty in Afghanistan," the
chief of the Russian drug watchdog said. "Some 250,000 peasant families
cultivate poppy in Afghanistan that is to say 2.5-3 million people from 28
millions living in the country," he said.
The conference will be held right after the four-party summit between
the presidents of Russia, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Tajikistan on
September 2 in Dushanbe. This fact underlines the topical nature of the
development in regional anti-drug cooperation, the Russian watchdog noted.
The agenda of the second meeting of the Central Asian anti-drug quartet
will be formed on the basis of the decisions taken at the Dushanbe summit.
The conference will discuss information cooperation, planning and joint
search operations against the ringleaders and members of the gangs, which
control the drug trafficking from Afghanistan through Central Asian
countries to Russia.
"The struggle with this evil will more efficient, if the
member-countries of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation and the
Collective Security Treaty Organisation join it," Ivanov believes.
Russia already offered to the world community the action plan to
destroy the drug production in Afghanistan codenamed Raduga-2 (Rainbow),
in which many countries interested and stated about their intentions to
implement this action plan engaging all the capabilities of the UN
Security Council.
Russia calls for "a higher status of the Afghan drug production
problem to the level of a threat to international peace and security,"
Ivanov remarked. The conference will issue a joint statement of the chiefs
of the drug watchdogs from Afghanistan, Pakistan, Russia and Tajikistan.
The first joint meeting of the Central Asian anti-drug quartet was
held on December 8, 2010, in Moscow under the chairmanship of Viktor
Ivanov. The chiefs of the drug watchdogs from Afghanistan, Pakistan and
Tajikistan participated in the meeting. Officials from the Russian Foreign
Ministry, the UN, the Collective Security Treaty Organisation and the
United States were invited as observers to the meeting. The Moscow meeting
developed a mechanism of cooperation for information exchange, search
operation in a country at the request of the law enforcement agencies from
another country. These meetings were decided to hold annually.
The drug watchdogs of Russia and Afghanistan are developing efficient
cooperation recently. On March 16, 2009, the countries signed an
intergovernmental agreement on cooperation in the struggle against illegal
circulation of narcotic drugs, psychotropic substances and their
precursors. The agreement became the first Russian-Afghan
intergovernmental document, which laid a legal basis for anti-drug
cooperation between the law enforcement agencies of the countries.
From October 2010 to February 2011 the Russian drug watchdog and the
drug police of Afghanistan and the US carried out four special operations
in the Nangarhar Province against the drug production. Four drug-making
laboratories, 1,499 kilograms of highly-quality heroin, 297 kilograms of
opium, 4,450 kilograms of morphine, 450 liters of acetic anhydride and 75
kilograms of ammonium were destroyed.