AFGHANISTAN'S DRUG KINGPINS ABOVE THE LAW

Garmser, Afghanistan -- The smugglers' trail jolts toward the
southern border, crossing salt-encrusted plains, scrabbly farmland
and hundreds of blossoming poppy fields. Suddenly, a fortress-like
compound looms.

Locals say the imposing, high-walled mansion near Garmser belongs to
Haji Adam, a well-known drug smuggler. Tales of his wealth are
legion. "When he became sick, he was flown directly to Germany," said
a man in the village of Garmser, who asked not to be named. "Even
helicopters have landed at his house," said another.

Like nearly every other major drug figure in the region, Adam appears
to worry little about the law. "Many smugglers don't even bother
hiding their wealth," said a British diplomat in Kabul, who spoke on
condition of anonymity. "It's their way of saying 'screw you' to authority."

Another bumper drug harvest is expected in Afghanistan, and kingpins
who control the $2.7 billion trade appear as untouchable as ever.
Afghan poppy-eradication workers for DynCorp International, a Texas
company that got a $174 million-a-year contract from the U.S. State
Department's Bureau for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement
Affairs, are chopping down poppy crops. But targeting unarmed and
penniless poppy farmers is easy; rounding up those at the pinnacle of
the drug trade business is much harder.

Afghanistan's top drug smugglers have been spectacularly successful
at evading Western and Afghan law enforcement. Although Western drugs
experts estimate there are several dozen major traffickers, just two
have been arrested since the Western-funded war on drugs started four
years ago -- Haji Baz Muhammad, who was extradited to the United
States in October, and Bashir Noorzai, arrested on arrival in New
York last April.

Several anti-drug experts working with Western embassies in Kabul,
who spoke on condition of anonymity, gave The Chronicle a profile of
the typical drug lord. Many live in fortified mansions, some defended
with anti-aircraft guns. Loyal tribesmen and heavily armed private
militias provide protection. And they reportedly enjoy political
support at the highest levels of government.

Persistent allegations of drug links have dogged some of
Afghanistan's most powerful figures, including several provincial
governors, Cabinet ministers and the president's own brother, Walid
Karzai. At least 17 members of the newly elected parliament have
active links to the trade, according to a study by analyst Andrew
Wilder of the Afghan Research and Evaluation Unit, a Kabul think tank.

But the most serious charges hover over Gen. Muhammad Daud, the
deputy interior minister for counternarcotics. One senior drug
official said his office was 99 percent sure that Daud was a player
in the trade he is supposed to be destroying. The official spoke on
condition that neither he nor his nationality be identified due to
the extreme sensitivity of the subject. "He frustrates
counternarcotics law enforcement when it suits him," the official
said. "He moves competent officials from their jobs, locks cases up
and generally ensures that nobody he is associated with will get
arrested for drug crimes."

Daud denies the allegations. "These rumors are the work of my
enemies," he said last year. At a news conference in February, he
said his forces had confiscated more than 100 tons of drugs in 2005.

Afghan undercover drug teams have had limited success in penetrating
the upper echelons of the drug networks. "Like most criminal
masterminds, they don't get their hands dirty with actual gear. You
try to get to their lieutenants, use intelligence to see what they're
up to and find where the money goes," said the official.

Typically, he said, drug kingpins have established power bases from
their days as mujahedeen commanders or tribal elders. They slip
easily in and out of Afghanistan using false passports or, less
often, small aircraft that can evade U.S. air traffic controllers
based in Qatar.

Many strike deals during the annual Muslim pilgrimage to Saudi
Arabia. "The hajj is a good place to do business, we believe," the
official said.

Western drug experts say part of the illicit profits are invested in
Kabul, where new glass-fronted commercial buildings and gaudy
mansions are springing up. Much of the rest may end up in Dubai,
where Western intelligence agents are working with officials of
United Arab Emirates to stanch the flow of drug money, the experts said.

Fears that Afghanistan is becoming a full-fledged "narco-state" are
swelling fast. Poppy cultivation dipped by 21 percent in 2005, after
President Hamid Karzai declared a jihad -- a government-sanctioned
holy war on drugs -- but is expected to rise sharply this year,
according to the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime. The greatest spike,
as much as 100 percent, is expected in Helmand province, where Adam,
the well-known smuggler, lives.

The desolate, sun-baked plains of southern Helmand are one of the
world's busiest heroin smuggling hubs. At night, high-speed convoys
race across the hard-packed desert toward Pakistan. The border, which
is controlled by Baluch tribesmen, has little relevance. "It's
basically Baluchistan, with a line running through it that happens to
have been drawn by some white guys," said the senior drug official.

The main smuggling hub is Baramcha, a notoriously lawless village on
the plains. It is entirely unpatrolled -- the last border police fled
for their lives five months ago, said Allahuddin, the district
intelligence chief, who goes by one name. "They attacked the customs
post, killed our soldiers and cut off their heads," he said.

From Baramcha, bricks of opium derived from the poppy sap are
spirited away by jeep, camel or bus, either south toward Pakistan's
Makran Coast or west into Iran. After it is purified into heroin,
most ends up on the streets of Europe.

Instability in the border area is fueled by a recent pact between
Taliban fighters and drug smugglers, apparently rooted in their
shared interest in excluding Karzai's pro-U.S. government from the
area. Last December, the Taliban attacked Garmser police
headquarters, killing nine officers. Smugglers provided the vehicles,
said district Gov. Haji Abdullah Jan. "Now they are working together," he said.

British forces arriving in Helmand as part of a NATO mission will
soon mount patrols along the porous border, said Lt. Col. Henry
Worsley, a British commander in the provincial capital, Laskhar Gah.

In Kabul, the dilapidated justice system is being overhauled to help
prosecute drug lords. A new counternarcotics law was recently
approved, and a special drug court has been set up in Kabul. So far,
14 judges, 36 investigators and 32 prosecutors have received
training. The court already has heard several hundred cases, mostly
involving low-level couriers and laboratory operators.

But even when drug criminals are prosecuted, they frequently bribe
their way to freedom, Western officials say. As a result, the United
States is now helping finance construction of a new drug lock-up with
a capacity for 50 prisoners at Policharki prison outside Kabul, due
to open later this year. Government officials and Western diplomats
say they hope to arrest the first major smuggler soon.

"I think if we get our act together, it's not unrealistic," said the
British diplomat. "But around here nothing is for sure."