Afghanistan riddled with drug ties

The problem, as illustrated by Commander Inayatullah's case, starts at the lowest levels of government. Three months ago, the Afghan police chief made his biggest drug bust yet. In a village in the northeastern province of Badakhshan, the commander arrested a suspected smuggler named Safiullah, and at the time confiscated 80 kilos of opium. But Inayatullah later refused to hand over the opium to the provincial police as evidence, say police officials. He was fired. The provincial police officials also say that Inayatullah may have arrested Safiullah only to get rid of competition from a fellow opium trader.

But Inayatullah steadfastly maintains his innocence.

"I cannot see the minister of interior directly to ask him what the evidence is against me," says Inayatullah, who is in Kabul awaiting reassignment in another district. "I'm the only police commander who has arrested smugglers in Badakhshan. Why am I accused of smuggling?"

Afghan officials interviewed say that Inayatullah's case isn't an isolated one. They say that the people facilitating the drug trade are often the very people who have been assigned to stop it - the police. But these police would not be able to act alone, they say, without the knowledge or consent of their superiors, including governors, provincial police chiefs, and even deputy ministers.

"Whatever number of police cars there are in Kabul, I can tell you that more than 50 percent of them are carrying drugs inside from one place to another," says a senior police commander in Kabul, requesting anonymity for his own safety. "The problem is that Afghanistan is training police to stop drug smugglers, and when they go out into the field, their police commander tells them how to protect the drug smugglers."

Those who confront the drug lords often find themselves in danger. Syed Ikramuddin, former governor of the northern province of Badakhshan, was nearly assassinated by a roadside bomb last October, as was vice presidential candidate Ahmed Zia Massoud in Faizabad. Mr. Ikramuddin survived, but the person sitting next to him was killed and two others were injured.

"Except for the minister of the interior himself, Mr. Ali Jalali, all the lower people from the heads of department down are involved in supporting drug smuggling," says Ikramuddin, who now serves as Afghanistan's minister of labor.

Ikramuddin says that many of these policemen and commanders are former warlords who have disarmed and reintegrated into government jobs, and are now using their position to facilitate the drug trade and get rich.

Among those corrupt commanders, he says, is Inayatullah, the police chief from Yawan, a district in the former governor's province. "Commander Inayatullah is a smuggler, I know him well," Ikramuddin says. "There is a competition among smugglers, that is why Inayatullah arrested Safiullah and the others. It's not to do his job honestly, but just to weaken a competitor."

The police chief who replaced Inayatullah is involved in the drug trade, according to several interior ministry officials. Kabul officials have ordered that he be removed from the position but say he is being protected by provincial police authorities. One senior Interior Ministry official says that the new chief paid a $60,000 bribe to get the job.

Despite corruption in the police ranks, many Afghan politicians say that Afghanistan's drug problem can be solved. "People inside the mafia should be introduced to the power of law," says Yunous Qanooni, a former presidential candidate in last year's elections and a top leader in the northern-based mujahideen party, Shura-e Nazar. "I'm sure that this will solve 70 percent of the problem, and the remaining 30 percent will be solved easily, step by step."

Minister of Labor Ikramuddin agrees that Afghanistan's drug problem is solvable, both with outside help and a little more political will from within. "If the world could not tolerate Afghanistan as the center of terrorism, then the world is not going to tolerate Afghanistan as the world's biggest producer of drugs. If we have good and honest people in this government, then gradually this problem can be solved. The carpet of the smugglers will be rolled up forever."

But Commander Inayatullah, the former police chief of Yawan, warns: "If we don't solve the problem now, there will be a day when all decisions will be made by smugglers."

• On Monday: Will poppy eradication programs work in Afghanistan?

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