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| Hans-Günter Meyer-Thompson | Illegal

Afghanistan. Profits and poppy: Afghanistan's illegal drug trade a boon for Taliban

Afghanistan. Profits and poppy: Afghanistan's illegal drug trade a boon for Taliban

WASHINGTON - The United States spent more than $8 billion over 15 years on efforts to deprive the Taliban of their profits from Afghanistan's opium and heroin trade, from poppy eradication to airstrikes and raids on suspected labs. 

That strategy failed. (…)

Some of those shipments are hurled across the heavily patrolled border to traffickers in Iran with rudimentary catapults, reported David Mansfield, a leading researcher into Afghanistan's illicit drug trade. (Reuters, 16.08.2021)

https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/profits-poppy-afghanistans-illegal-drug-trade-boon-taliban-2021-08-16