Opium Funding Afghan Unrest
KABUL The top U.S. general in Afghanistan said yesterday he estimated that Afghanistan’s rampant opium poppy cultivation was funding up to 40 percent of the Taliban-led insurgency.
Gen. Dan McNeill, head of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force, added he had been told by an international specialist that his figure was likely low and could reach up to 60 percent.
The cultivation of opium 93 percent of whose world supply comes from Afghanistan, according to the United Nations is undermining everything the government and its international allies were trying to do, he said. Afghanistan’s opium production grew by 34 percent this year, according to a U.N. survey.
Washington Times
October 19, 2007
KABUL The top U.S. general in Afghanistan said yesterday he estimated that Afghanistan’s rampant opium poppy cultivation was funding up to 40 percent of the Taliban-led insurgency.
Gen. Dan McNeill, head of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force, added he had been told by an international specialist that his figure was likely low and could reach up to 60 percent.
The cultivation of opium 93 percent of whose world supply comes from Afghanistan, according to the United Nations is undermining everything the government and its international allies were trying to do, he said. Afghanistan’s opium production grew by 34 percent this year, according to a U.N. survey.
Washington Times
October 19, 2007
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