THE TALEBAN TRAIL

Twisting paths through Afghanistan and Whitehall

Few governments have ever depended so heavily for their income on the
destruction and death of young people as Taleban, the fanatical rulers of
Afghanistan. Smuggling opium to Western Europe is now virtually the only
source of income for these hypocritical Islamic fundamentalists; the more
heroin addicts they recruit, the richer they become.

In the past year, Afghanistan has more than doubled its production of opium
to 4,600 tonnes. For all the prohibitions in the Koran on drug-taking,
Taleban levies a 20 per cent tax on the crop, which is then smuggled by
heavily armed intermediaries to Western Europe. Ninety-five per cent of all
the heroin sold in Britain comes from Afghanistan.

Containing this plague is now a top priority for the United Nations;
attempts to curb production inside the country have been thwarted by the
exodus from Kabul of international agencies.

The UN International Drug Control Programme is now trying to strengthen law
enforcement agencies in countries bordering Afghanistan and on the transit
routes to Europe. It is a hard task. Some countries, especially Pakistan
which was long the main exit route for Afghan opium, have been so corrupted
that smugglers operate with impunity.

Pakistan is paying a heavy price: it now has the highest heroin addiction
in the world.

Stopping the shipments through Iran, Turkey and the Balkans is no easier:
scores of Iranian police have been killed in gunfights, Turkey can barely
patrol its mountain passes and the ruthlessness of gangs operating in the
Balkans is more than a match for underfunded local police.

Britain has just announced a grant of pounds 2.2 million to various UN
anti-drug operations to curb the flow from Afghanistan and Latin America.
This is money well spent and comes on top of bilateral grants to train drug
police or equip Iranian patrols with bulletproof vests.

Britain is the third largest donor to the UN drug control programme, one of
the few practical steps towards reducing availability on the streets of
Europe.

What is less evident, however, is the effectiveness of the other measures
in the anti-drug campaign within this country, spearheaded by Keith
Hellawell, the former Chief Constable of West Yorkshire. Mr Hellawell has
had two years to draw up a strategy to fight the alarming increase in drug
abuse. He has established priorities, insisting that the fight must
concentrate on the most dangerous drugs such as heroin and cocaine.

He has found pounds 6 million to fund the first proper research into which
strategies work. He has put money into ensuring that treatment is swiftly
available to young addicts after they are picked up. And he has
concentrated on the explosion of drug use in prisons.

But the American example of using "czars" as quick fixes for awkward issues
is hardly encouraging; the outlines of Britain's ten-year strategy remain
vague. And Mr Hellawell, a man in no doubt of his own competence but who
lacks an insider's knowledge of Whitehall, has found it difficult to steer
his proposals through the bureaucracy. The job is still new, the terrain
unknown and the public expectation of quick results unrealistic. But if his
appointment is to go beyond government tokenism, he should now have in
place a policy that is better known across Whitehall and the country.