The head of Russia's drug control agency said on Monday that it brooked no delay to eradicate drug production in Afghanistan.
The Afghan drug production problem "needs an urgent and radical solution," said Viktor Ivanov, Director of the Federal Service for Control of Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Circulation, at a press conference.
"For the last eight years the heroin production in Afghanistan skyrocketed 40 times and currently the heroin production is twice the volume than the whole world produced ten years ago," he said.
The fact that 92 percent of the world opiates production originated from the troubled Central Asian state has rendered the Afghan drug production "a really global phenomenon, the world problem," he said.
Ivanov thus proposed five measures to genuinely eradicate drug production in the country. Firstly, the UN Security Council should raise the status of the Afghan drug problem "to the level of a threat to international peace and security."
Secondly, infrastructure development programs shall serve as the basic instruments to solve the issue.
Thirdly, opium poppy crops in Afghanistan shall be collected and destroyed.
Fourthly, joint efforts shall be exerted on training highly qualified Afghan drug policemen. And finally, an international committee propounded by Russia and the European Union on uprooting Afghan drug production shall be set up, said Ivanov.
Afghanistan is the world's largest producer of heroin. The international community has been split on how to best tackle the issue with some arguing that military operations should stick to fighting terrorists while others thinking armed groups should target opium production. |