June 26, 2002	Wednesday	Rabi-us-Sani 14, 1423

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KABUL, June 25: Afghanistan is still the top supplier of heroin to Europe and produces almost the entire bulk of opiates consumed in central Asia, a top United Nations narcotics official said on Tuesday.

“Afghanistan is the source of about 70 to 90 per cent of the heroin found in European markets,” said Bernard Frahi, the head of the United Nations Drug Control Programme, on the eve of the World Day Against Drug Abuse and Trafficking.

“Afghanistan is the source of almost 100pc of opiates (opium, morphine and heroin) consumed in neighbouring countries, meaning Iran, Pakistan and central Asian states,” Mr Frahi told a briefing here.

A UNDCP report, to be released at its Vienna headquarters on Wednesday, put the number of opiate users in the region at roughly 3.5 million, including two million in Russia, he said.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai has vowed to eradicate poppy- cultivation from the country.

He issued two decrees earlier this year banning poppy cultivation throughout the country.

Opium production had fallen drastically under the former Taliban regime after it imposed a total ban on poppy cultivation.

But local farmers have resumed growing poppy in many provinces since the Taliban’s fall and replacement by the Karzai-led administration in December.

The UNDCP assisted Kabul in launching a cash-compensation programme for poppy farmers earlier this year in an effort to cut back poppy cultivation.

“Some eradication has taken place in the major poppy-growing provinces of Afghanistan,” Mr Frahi said.—AFP