Terrorism and drug trade

Business Recorder

4 days ago

'The black market, the informal financial system, porous borders, a permissive security environment, and under-resourced Pakistani law enforcement, investigative, and prosecutorial agencies all contribute to the substantial demand for and facilitation of money laundering and illicit financial services in Pakistan—'—International Narcotics Control Strategy Report (INCSR March 2025)
Terrorism, drugs-for-arms and money laundering, intrinsically linked, pose considerable threats to global peace and security besides destabilizing political and financial stability of many nation States. The militancy and fundamentalism has clear nexus with criminal networks involved in drug and arms.
The critics allege that in the aftermath of 9/11, United States and its allies' military actions against innocent civilians are more than concentrated attacks on the terrorists. All the terrorist networks in the world enjoy close ties with many criminal groups. These militant outfits enjoy free flow of legal and illegal funds and no serious effort has been made until today to attack their financial lifeline.
June 26, 2024 marked the International Day against drug abuse and illicit trafficking. The worldwide observance was decided by the United Nations General Assembly in 1987 to raise the level of awareness in the international community about the dangers of drug abuse, to prevent its spread and to encourage all efforts to combat the menace at international level. Each year the United Nation Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) selects theme for the day and this year the theme is 'Breaking the Chains: Prevention, Treatment, and Recovery for All!'.
The drug trade in the post-Taliban Afghanistan was institutionalized. Opium was processed into morphine and heroin inside Afghanistan as it meant a lot more money for commanders on the ground, something made apparent by the switch to ever more expensive jeeps. Controlled democracy in Afghanistan was playing into the hands of more sophisticated narco-enriched commanders. The United States and allies were in negotiation with Taliban and they never thought about ways to buy or muscle a vote that will protect their opium interests in the next election.
Even the neighbours of Afghanistan were making profits from the windfall: 'criminal groups from Central Asia', revealed the UN reports, 'made profits of US$8.2 billion from the trafficking of opiates in 2012'. Tajikistan was at time remained the worst affected by the drug plague, thanked to a combination of history, poverty and geography.
In the late 1990s, drug trade was believed to be a source of finance for the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU), a terrorist group that had bases in Afghanistan and Tajikistan. After the war in Afghanistan, the IMU lost most of its influence, but the drugs trade continues, with organized criminals taking the place of political or religious activists.
In a survey conducted by the Open Society Institute, eight out of ten of those polled said, hardly surprisingly, that the main reason to turn to drug trafficking was to make big money.
Geography also contributes to Tajikistan's drugs problem: at 1,400km, the country's border with Afghanistan is longer than its Central Asian neighbours', and commensurately more difficult to guard. Afghanistan's north-eastern province of Badakhshan, an important poppy-growing area, is close to the border with Tajikistan. From there, most narcotics move to Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan (where Osh has become a hub of trafficking) before continuing to Kazakhstan and onwards to Russia.
Three of Afghanistan's five big drug-producing provinces – Helmand, Uruzgan, and Kandhar – are spreading to new areas, and with it insecurity. The nightmare is a new Colombia: a place where drug lords capture and wreck governments and the economy alike. The Afghan government has made no progress against poppy-growing, except declaring it illegal and establishing a new policy body, the Counter-Narcotics Department (CND). Its goal is 100% elimination by 2013, whereas in reality production has increased.
The continuing instability in Afghanistan remained an important risk factor for Central Asia. However, the spectre of the Talibanisation of the whole region probably never had much substance. Poverty, lack of political freedom, ignorance about Islam was, and still, exploited by ruthless outsiders, and money from the drug trade make up an explosive cocktail.
Most of the region's economies have still not fully recovered from the collapse of the Soviet system. Poverty is widespread in all the countries, especially in rural areas, and the gap between rich and poor is widening. For many local politicians, such economic factors, along with natural disasters and border problems, constitute far bigger headaches than Islamic radicalism.
Opposition forces in Central Asia, together with human-rights activists, argue that the Islamic redicalism threat is being exaggerated to crush all forms of dissent, religious or otherwise. But even those who think that Islamic radicalism and terrorism are real dangers criticise the governments' heavy-handed methods of controlling religion.
Central Asia has become a main transit route for opium and heroin from Afghanistan to the streets of Europe. The UN reckons that about a quarter of all heroin coming out of Afghanistan passes through the region.
Traditionally, Afghan opium was trafficked through Pakistan and Iran. Both countries remain important export routes, but a northern alternative via Central Asia developed rapidly in the early 1990s, partly because of Pakistan's and Iran's efforts to crack down on the traffic and partly because Russian border guards were withdrawn from most of the region when the Soviet Union collapsed. The civil war in Tajikistan in 1992-97 also proved beneficial to the drugs trade.
America could have played a useful role by acknowledging and supporting the efforts of Iran – whose policy on drugs is in many ways more intelligent – and by cracking down on (rather than supporting) warlords and commanders, its special forces know to be, trafficking opium. However, the American stance is diametrically opposite. It has been levelling baseless allegations against Iran. It unveiled the hidden agenda of the United States of America in Afghanistan and elsewhere to promote drug trade, religious fundamentalism and mass acceptance of its policies of fascism for its own self-interests and economic benefits.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2025