'SCREW YOU,' SAY AFGHAN DRUG LORDS

The smugglers trail crosses salt-encrusted plains, scrabbly farmland
and hundreds of blossoming poppy fields. Suddenly a fortress-like
structure looms. The high-walled mansion belongs to Haji Adam, an
opium smuggler, locals say. Tales of his wealth are legion.

"When he became sick he was flown straight to Germany," said a man in
the next village, Garmser, speaking on condition of anonymity. "Even
helicopters have landed at his house," said another.

Yet, like every Afghan drug lord, Haji Adam has little to fear from
the law. Since the Western-led war on drugs started four years ago,
only two major smugglers have been arrested -- Haji Baz Muhammad, who
was extradited to the United States last October, and Bashir Noorzai,
who was arrested in New York six months earlier. But the remainder
are apparently untouchable.

"Many smugglers don't even bother hiding their wealth," said a
British diplomat in Kabul. "It's their way of saying screw you to
authority."

The kingpins are as wealthy as they are indiscreet, the apex of a
$2,7-billion trade that has dominated the Afghan economy, poisoned
its politics and employs one in 10 of the workforce. The smugglers
are deeply rooted in Afghanistans tribal society yet operate with the
sophistication of a criminal jet set. Some live in fortified rural
mansions, defended by anti-aircraft guns and gangs of heavily armed
clansmen.

Many strike deals during the annual Muslim pilgrimage to Saudi
Arabia. "The Hajj is a good place to do business, we believe," said
one Western anti-drugs official.

Every year the drug lords effortlessly export 4 000 tonnes of opium
across Afghanistans borders, plugging into the Turkish, Iranian,
Pakistani and Russian gangs that refine the drug into heroin for sale
in Europe. But their strongest connections are at home. Allegations
of drug links have persistently dogged some of Afghanistans most
powerful figures, including several governors, ministers and the
presidents brother, Walid Karzai. At least 17 of the 249 newly
elected parliamentarians are smugglers, said analyst Andrew Wilder.

But the most serious charges hover over General Muhammad Daud, the
Deputy Interior Minister for Counter Narcotics. A senior drugs
official said he was "99% sure" that Daud had a stake in the trade he
was supposed to be dismantling. "He frustrates counter-narcotics law
enforcement when it suits him," said the official, who spoke on
condition of anonymity.

"He moves competent officials from their jobs, locks cases up and
generally ensures that nobody he is associated with will get arrested
for drugs crime."

Daud has denied the allegations.

Undercover Afghan policemen have tried to infiltrate the smuggling
rings, the same diplomat said, but failed to net any big fishc.

The drug lords funnel their -profits into construction in Kabul,
where mansions and glass-fronted office blocks are springing up, and
to Dubai, where US and British anti-drug specialists are cooperating
with local authorities to stem the flow of laundered money.

The daunting scale of the drugs war can be best appreciated in
Helmand, the remote southern province that is the worlds busiest
opium smuggling route. At night high-speed convoys laden with
narcotics race across the hard-packed desert towards the border with
Pakistan. The frontier is effectively controlled by the Baluch, a
tribe with long experience of smuggling that regards the British-
demarcated border as a technicality. The main smugglers den is in
Baramcha, a rough-and-tumble village along the unmanned border. From
Baramcha, about two-thirds of the contraband is spirited south
towards Karachi or the more secluded Makran coast. Another third
moves west by road into Iran. The final destination, after being
purified into heroin, is often Britain.

The smugglers have been fortified by an informal alliance with the
Taliban. Britain hopes to break their stranglehold on Helmand with a
deployment of more than 3 000 British troops that starts next month.

Paratroopers will mount a week-long mission to Baramcha, said
Lieutenant Colonel Henry Worsley.

The fledgling Afghan forces are also trying to apply pressure. Last
Monday the Afghan Special Narcotics Force, a British-trained elite
para-military squad, raided Baramcha. Some small-scale smugglers, one
Western official said, were angry that Taliban militants did not keep
their promise to defend them.

Western efforts are also focused on overhauling the Afghan justice-
system. A new counter-narcotics law was approved last December and a
special drugs court has been set up.

But even when drug criminals are prosecuted, they frequently bribe
their way to freedom. Britain is helping to fund a new drugs wing at
Pul-i-Charki prison outside Kabul, which is due to open later this
year. But anti-narcotic officials are only moderately optimistic it
will be filled. "Afghanistan is a tough place to do business," said
one. "We all want stuff to happen yesterday, but everyone knows its
not going to happen like that."