Pubdate: Sun, 22 May 2005
Source: Watertown Daily Times (NY)
Copyright: 2005 Watertown Daily Times
Contact:  http://www.wdt.net
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/792
Author: New York Times
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/heroin.htm (Heroin)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/topics/afghanistan

U.S. MEMO CONTENDS KARZAI WEAK ON FIGHT AGAINST HEROIN

WASHINGTON - U.S. Officials warned this month in an internal
assessment that an American-financed poppy eradication program aimed
at curtailing Afghanistan's huge heroin trade had been ineffective, in
part because President Hamid Karzai "has been unwilling to assert
strong leadership."

A cable sent on May 13 from the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, the Afghan
capital, said the provincial officials and village elders, many of
whom are suspected of having ties to the drug trade, had impeded
destruction of significant poppy acreage and that top Afghan
officials, including Karzai, had done little to overcome the local
resistance.

"Although President Karzai has been well aware of the difficulty in
trying to implement an effective ground eradication program, he has
been unwilling to assert strong leadership, even in his own province
of Kandahar," said the cable, which was drafted by embassy personal
involved in the anti-drug efforts, two American officials said.

A copy of the three-page cable, which was addressed to Secretary of
State Condoleezza Rice, was shown to The New York Times by an American
official alarmed at the slow pace of the destruction of poppy fields.

The criticism of Karzai reflected mounting frustration among some
American officials that plans to uproot large swaths of Afghanistan's
poppy crop have produced little success. Those officials said they
worried that heroin trafficking could threaten the American-led
reconstruction effort in Afghanistan and worsen corruption in the
country's fledgling central government.

Since last fall, when it became clear that Afghanistan was seeing a
surge in poppy cultivation, American officials have said publicly that
Karzai recognized the severity of the problem and was determined to
combat it, albeit gradually, to avoid inciting unrest among Afghans
whose incomes are dependant on growing poppies for the drug trade.

The supplemental spending bill that recently passed Congress included
$260 million to finance the State Department's anti-drug effort in
Afghanistan this year.

A senior State Department official said that Karzai had wanted the
eradication team to begin work sooner, before the poppy harvest season
began, when he felt there was a better chance of persuading farmers to
give up that lucrative crop. But because of bad weather and other
delays the team did not begin work until early April, after the
harvest, which normally last from March to July, had begun.

The American officials involved said they also believed that Karzai
might not want to challenge local Afghan authorities, fearing that
such an effort might incite opposition and even violence ahead of
parliamentary elections scheduled for next fall.
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MAP posted-by: Larry Seguin