Word: opium
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...TIME: There has obviously been some worrying news out of Afghanistan over the last few weeks, fighting in the south, reports about [opium] poppy cultivation. For a lot of people outside of Afghanistan there is a sense that the world is failing and that the effort to build a new Afghanistan is faltering...
...also at work. Afghanistan ranks 117 out of 158 on Transparency International's 2005 index of perceived corruption. Around 60% of the population has no electricity, and 80% no potable water. The returning refugees have found few houses or jobs. The country is the world's biggest supplier of opium, the raw material for heroin. The illegal drug economy - which some analysts estimate is equivalent to half the country's official gdp - corrupts its politics, and finances the Taliban's recruitment of the unemployed and its purchase of high-quality weapons. President Karzai is highly regarded by the foreign politicians...
...between them. Sure, they call in the coalition forces, but they take 24 hours to arrive. How are they supposed to provide security under those conditions?" On top of this is a paradox at the heart of ISAF's strategy: a decision to overlook poppy cultivation, even though the opium trade is a central prop of the Taliban. But an eradication program would suck ISAF into a grinding war with locals who have no other way to earn a living. All that leaves NATO governments in an awkward bind. They have had to acquiesce in the Pentagon's proposed drawdown...
...billion Cost of an unsuccessful campaign to eradicate Afghanistan's opium crops, which one Western counternarcotics official has called "an absolute disaster...
...billion Expected profit from this year's Afghan opium crop, the largest yield in history