IN DRUG TRIAL, SHARPLY DIFFERING PORTRAITS OF AFGHAN WITH TIES TO THE TALIBAN

In the trial of Haji Bashir Noorzai, an Afghan man charged with
running an international drug ring, there was little disagreement on
Thursday over some basic facts.

In opening arguments before the jury in Federal District Court in
Manhattan, a prosecutor and a defense lawyer both depicted Mr.
Noorzai as a powerful tribal leader in Afghanistan who had developed
close ties with the ruling Taliban before the terror attacks of Sept.
11, 2001. He controlled vast tracts of land and employed hundreds of
laborers, and had his own police force and courts.

But from there, the stories diverged.

The prosecutor, Anirudh Bansal, told the jury that Mr. Noorzai's
"greed for money, for power" had led him into a corrupt relationship
with the Taliban, to whom he gave money and arms in return for
protection of his narcotics trafficking business.

That drug ring sold heroin around the world, and some of it ended up
in New York, prosecutors have said.

Mr. Bansal said that in 2005, Mr. Noorzai flew to New York seeking
more protection: He offered to tell the authorities about his drug
activities in return for the United States government's securing him
a "high position in the new government of Afghanistan." After 11 days
of talks with federal agents, Mr. Noorzai was arrested.

But Mr. Noorzai's defense lawyer, Ivan S. Fisher, told the jury that
Mr. Noorzai had only the best of intentions when he came to New York
three years ago: He wanted to help the Americans locate fugitive
Taliban officials, like Mullah Mohammad Omar, the one-eyed cleric and
reclusive Taliban leader who has been in hiding since the 2001 terror attacks.

And Mr. Noorzai offered to help the Americans "develop relationships
with high-level Taliban moderates in an effort to put together a
government that will work with you," Mr. Fisher said.

Contrasting portraits of a defendant are not unusual in trials, but
the Noorzai case has an extraordinary degree of intrigue about it
because it has brought into a New York City courtroom the chaos of
Afghanistan and the grip of its narcotics trade, and the looming
figure of Mr. Omar, one of the most wanted men in the world.

And then there are the murky circumstances of how and why Mr.
Noorzai, who is in his 40s, came to the United States. His lawyer,
Mr. Fisher, has argued previously in court papers that he was
promised safe passage by two American contractors named Mike and
Brian if he agreed to meet with American officials and provide
information about terrorism financing.

But the jury did not hear about those circumstances. The court has
ruled that even if such tactics occurred, they did not invalidate the
charges and could not be used as a defense during the trial.

In court, Mr. Noorzai, who has said in court papers that he led a
tribe of one million members, sat quietly at the defense table,
listening to the opening statements through a Pashto interpreter.

The prosecutor, Mr. Bansal, told the jury that as the Taliban gained
control of Afghanistan, "the Taliban needed the help of tribal
warlords" like Mr. Noorzai.

Mr. Noorzai gave the Taliban weapons and money as well as his
militia, Mr. Bansal said. "In return, the Taliban made Bashir Noorzai
a very powerful man in Afghanistan," the prosecutor said.

"Noorzai exploited his power, his influence with the Taliban to
continue his drug-trafficking activities with impunity after the
Taliban took control," Mr. Bansal said.

Even after the Taliban banned opium cultivation, Mr. Bansal said, Mr.
Noorzai continued to traffic in opium and heroin "without any
interference from the Taliban government."

In his opening, Mr. Fisher asked the jury to reject what he called
the government's "awful charges."

He described his client's role as a teenager who joined the fight
against the Soviet invasion of his country, and the way Mr. Noorzai
ascended to chief of the Noorzai tribe after his father died in 2000.
Mr. Fisher emphasized that Mr. Noorzai's goal was to help build a
stable government in his country. His client, he said, "has spent his
entire life attempting to keep Afghanistan Afghanistan."

Late in the day, an F.B.I. agent, Craig McLaughlin, testified about a
series of meetings with Mr. Noorzai in a New York hotel in 2005
before Mr. Noorzai was arrested.

In his cross-examination, Mr. Fisher asked whether the agent had told
Mr. Noorzai that he was a "guest" of the United States.

The agent said he had, as a means of building rapport with Mr.
Noorzai. But Mr. Noorzai "was not free to leave," he added.