NATO Troops Target Afghan Drug Lords

Diverse revenue streams defy crackdown efforts

(NEWSER) - The Taliban is thriving financially, despite the US’ best efforts to clamp down on its cash flow, thanks to a sophisticated collection of revenue streams including foreign donations, criminal activities, and drug trade profits. “I don’t believe we can significantly alter their effectiveness by cutting off their money right now,” one House Intelligence Committee member tells the New York Times. “It’s just bigger and more complex than we can effectively stop.” More»

(NEWSER) - The US is changing tactics in its war against the Afghan opium trade, the AP reports. Rather than targeting crops for eradication, the US will focus on interdiction and alternative crop programs. A top administration official called eradication “a waste of money” that failed to divert “a single dollar” of the roughly $70 million militants made in the opium and heroin trade last year. More»

(NEWSER) - US and Afghan forces seized a massive drug cache and and killed 60 militants in a four-day operation in Helmand province, Reuters reports. The troops scored more than 17 tons of morphine, opium, and heroin, along with 75 tons of poppy seeds, and caches of weapons and equipment, the military said. More»

International agencies alarmed by 8,000 of tons of missing opium

(NEWSER) - A huge pile of missing opium has international law enforcement agencies worried, Time reports. The UN estimates up to 8,000 tons of opium—enough to supply every addict in the world for two years—have disappeared between Afghanistan's poppy fields and the world market in recent years. Experts fear the Taliban is building a mammoth stockpile of the drug. More»

Hundreds of tons of chemicals seized

(NEWSER) - The UN has been quietly striking a major blow against the Taliban with a widely successful international attack on its heroin trade, Bloomberg reports. The campaign has seized several hundred tons of acetic anhydride bound for Afghanistan. Without the chemical, the Taliban can’t convert its poppy, which sells for about $100 per kilo, into heroin, which fetches about $3,500 per kilo. More»