The UN’s drugs czar told NATO that Afghan insurgents were withholding thousands of tonnes of opium and treating their drugs like “savings accounts” to manipulate street prices in the West, according to a US cable released on WikiLeaks.
Antonio Maria Costa, head of the UN office on drugs and crime, told NATO that the Taliban and organized crime gangs had withheld 12,400 tonnes of opium from the international market to keep the price of heroin and opium at a profitable level. The opium withheld was worth about US$1.25 billion. Each tonne of opium is said to be worth about US$100,000 and can be used to produce 100kg of heroin.
MARKET SAVVY
The US cable appears to show that the UN believed the Taliban and other insurgents in Afghanistan were aware of the market and focused on maintaining a viable price for the drug. Reports on the Taliban’s involvement in the drug trade from last year have focused on splits between drug gangs and highlighted rivalries.
Costa’s claims, reported in a confidential document, were expressed at a meeting on Sept. 18 last year. He was briefing NATO and its partners on last year’s Afghanistan Survey, the UN’s annual assessment of the drugs industry in the country. Afghanistan is the world’s biggest exporter of heroin and opium — most of which is grown in Helmand Province, where British troops continue to lose their lives.
Under the heading “Opium Stocks Remain High, the cable states: “Costa said that Afghanistan has 12,400 tonnes of opium stocks because it produces more than the world consumes. Costa believes that the insurgency is withholding these stocks from the market and treating them like ‘savings accounts.’”
Costa’s reported opinion was not part of the UN’s final Afghanistan survey last year.
According to the cable, opium cultivation fell by 22 percent last year to its lowest level in 15 years.
Costa, who retired this year, prompted international debate when he claimed billions of dollars of laundered drug money from organized crime had propped up many of the world’s leading financial institutions during the economic downturn.
INFECTION
According to this year’s UN Afghanistan Survey, total opium production this year is estimated at 3,600 tonnes, down 48 percent from last year. The decrease was largely because of a plant infection hitting the poppy-growing provinces of Helmand and Kandahar particularly hard. Yield fell to 29.2kg per hectare, from 56.1kg the previous year.
This year’s survey has acknowledged that Afghan drug lords have stockpiled some drugs. About 87 percent of total opium production took place in the south and 12 percent in the west last year. A spokesman for the UN declined to comment.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
A top Vietnamese property tycoon was on Thursday sentenced to death in one of the biggest corruption cases in history, with an estimated US$27 billion in damages. A panel of three hand-picked jurors and two judges rejected all defense arguments by Truong My Lan, chair of major developer Van Thinh Phat, who was found guilty of swindling cash from Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB) over a decade. “The defendant’s actions ... eroded people’s trust in the leadership of the [Communist] Party and state,” read the verdict at the trial in Ho Chi Minh City. After the five-week trial, 85 others were also sentenced on
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of