Pubdate: Mon, 04 Aug 2008
Source: Globe and Mail (Canada)
Copyright: 2008 The Globe and Mail Company
Contact:  http://www.globeandmail.ca/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/168
Author: Jane Taber

AFGHAN DRUG TRADE CITED IN CANADIAN CASUALTIES

NATO Countries Should Refuse To Support Karzai Unless He Cracks Down
Visibly Before Election, Former U.S. Diplomat Says

A former senior U.S. diplomat in Afghanistan says Canadians should be
"hopping mad" the Conservative government is not pressing the Afghan
government to crack down on opium farmers.

Thomas Schweich said yesterday that the flourishing opium and heroin
trade is financing the insurgency that is resulting in Canadian
soldiers being killed in Kandahar. Afghan President Hamid Karzai is
doing nothing about it, he said on CTV's Question Period.

He said the NATO countries should "present a unified front to
President Karzai" and tell him that they cannot support his government
if he continues to turn a blind eye to the drug trade.

"Right now there's not much of any of that going on in his power base
of Helmand and Kandahar and I think [we need] a unified NATO approach
to President Karzai, [telling him] that we're not going to put up with
it any more, our troops are dying because of this. ... We cannot
continue to support you unless you crack down visibly on the drug
trade now before the election," said Mr. Schweich, who served as a
senior counternarcotics official for two years in Afghanistan,
starting in early 2006.

"You need to hit the trade at all levels. You need to eradicate the
poppy fields, you need to close down the labs, you need to arrest the
corrupt officials who are supporting it, and you need to arrest the
people who are transiting these drugs."

Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister David Emerson, asked on Question
Period about the poppy crop situation in Afghanistan, said the Taliban
are financing much of their activity through the production of heroin
and opium. He said Canada is prepared to "step up and be part of the
solution." He also said the Harper government supports Mr. Karzai.

"But you can't just look at going out and wiping out the farmers' crop
as the only way, or indeed maybe even the best way, to approach it,"
Mr. Emerson said. "There's a total supply chain when it comes to
drugs, and it may well be better to focus on interdiction, to break
down the downstream supply chain that creates the value as opposed to
going out and alienating the farmers whose support you ultimately need
as you build a democracy in Afghanistan."

Mr. Schweich said he doesn't believe Mr. Karzai is personally involved
in the narcotics trade. Rather, his connection is that he is afraid to
take on the growers of poppy crops because his power base is in
Helmand province and Kandahar, where Canadian troops are stationed.

"That's where 70 to 80 per cent of the opium is grown. And he does not
crack down on the people there because he needs their support for
re-election," said Mr. Schweich, who is now a visiting professor of
law at Washington University in St. Louis. "That's what I think his
involvement is."
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MAP posted-by: dan