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UNDP Administrator Mark Malloch Brown talks with host Daljit Dhaliwal.
 Watch the video Dial-up | DSL or read the transcript.
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Should the U.S. declare a war on drugs in Afghanistan and Central Asia?
While the war on terror continues apace, another, equally pernicious threat is looming in Afghanistan and Central Asia -- drugs. Afghanistan accounts for roughly 79 percent of the world's opium and heroin trade and over half of the Afghan drug traffic goes through its neighbors to the north, in poverty-stricken Central Asia, according to the United Nations Drug Control Programme.
Central Asia's Opium Terrorists
By Tamara Makarenko
August 22, 2002
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As the U.S. military build-up continues in Central Asia, one frequently overlooked factor in the region's stability demands attention. It is the link between Afghan opiates and terrorism.
| 1979 |
Soviet Union invades Afghanistan. Mujahaddin cultivate opium to buy weapons.
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| 1989 |
Afghanistan produces 35 percent of the world's opium.
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| 1999 |
Afghanistan becomes the world's largest producer of opium.
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| 2000 |
The Taliban outlaw opium poppy cultivation.
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| 2001 |
During U.S. attacks on Afghanistan, farmers start planting opium poppies.
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| 2002
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The Afghan Interim Administration issues a ban on opium poppy cultivation.
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After September 11, Western government officials and media reports put the onus for this link on al-Qaeda and the Taliban. But neither of these groups was ever interested in the large-scale production or trafficking of opiates.
The alliance between narcotics and terror is spearheaded by a terrorist group little known to most Westerners, but one, which, with an estimated 70 percent of Central Asia's drug trade under its control, according to Interpol, is the true wildcard for stability in the region. Its name is the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU).
Founded in 1998 by underground mullah Tohir Yuldashev and Afghan War vet Juma Namangani, the IMU declares as its goal the overthrow of the repressive regime of Uzbekistan's President Islam Karimov -- one with a long track record of persecuting practicing Uzbek Muslims -- and the establishment of an Islamic state. The group fought with the Taliban and al-Qaeda against U.S. forces during the war in Afghanistan and is believed to have received funding both from Osama bin Laden and Saudi sources. It has operated out of bases in both Tajikistan -- where Namangani fought with Islamic militants during that country's 1992-1997 civil war -- and, of late, Afghanistan.
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Inside This Episode
 To follow an Afghan opium trade route through Central Asia and on to Russia, check out our Photo Essay.
Use our Interactive Map to size up the scope of Afghanistan's opium industry.
Read the Heroin Handbook to find out how opium poppies are turned into heroin.
A poppy farmer at work in Afghanistan.
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