UK attempt to eradicate Afghan opium fails

The International Narcotics Control Board reports that the opium crop in Afghanistan - which is the source of more than 90% of the heroin sold on Britain's streets - reached a bumper 4,200 tonnes, up 800 tonnes on the previous year.

The rise is a blow to Tony Blair who told the Labour party conference in 2000 that the war against the Taliban was an opportunity to eradicate the poppy harvest which is the source of three-quarters of all the world's heroin.

The INCB report says that Britain has the highest heroin seizure rate in Europe and the third highest number of heroin addicts.

The publication of the UN report also coincides with Home Office figures showing that the cocaine and crack culture is reaching record levels in England and Wales. The figures show the number of class A drug offences, including those involving heroin and cocaine, rose by 5% to 35,610 in 2003.

Hamid Ghodse, the INCB's president, said the British-led attempt to persuade Afghan farmers to grow other cash crops had failed. In 2003 farmers grew 3,600 tonnes of opium poppies in 17 out of the 28 districts of Afghanistan. Now it has spread to all 28 districts, with the area under cultivation increasing last year from 80,000 hectares (200,000 acres) to 130,000 hectares. The INCB said this compared with only 165 tonnes grown during the brutally enforced ban by the Taliban on opium production.

"The Afghanistan government needs to do something very serious, very quickly," said Professor Ghodse. "If it is not going to be a narcotics state, which is a risk, then Afghanistan needs to do very urgent action in eradication and alternative development."

Although opium prices fell considerably between 2003 and 2004 they remain above $100 (£52) a kg - far higher than any other cash crop - and a crucial source of finance for the private armies of the drug warlords in Afghanistan.

The crop eradication programme is supported by a British-led international consortium, and tries to persuade farmers to grow alternative crops through negotiation. But it is now believed to be under pressure from the American administration which wants to adopt a forced crop eradication programme similar to that seen in Colombia in the last five years.

The UN report also warns of an alarming spread in HIV/Aids among injecting drug users in eastern Europe, Russia and central Europe with an estimated 4 million people now believed to be infected.

Britain's former deputy drug tsar Mike Trace said yesterday there would be an alarming US-led attempt next week at the UN's annual commission on narcotic drugs meeting in Vienna to rule out the use of needle exchange and other programmes to deal with the growing epidemic.

Needle exchange schemes have been used in Britain since the 1980s to ensure one of the lowest rates of HIV infection among heroin injectors in Europe. Mr Trace, now a spokesman for the International Drug Policy Consortium, said governments that provided practical help, such as free access to clean syringes, could achieve significant reductions in the level of HIV infections.

But he said the US was consciously trying to tie aid to "moral lines in the sand" and would not endorse needle exchanges or heroin substitution programmes.

Britain and the rest of the EU are expected to criticise the move in Vienna next week but a vote to withdraw support from needle exchange programmes would send a damaging signal to the governments of the former Soviet Union.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/afghanistan/story/0,1284,1428288,00.html