FEATHERS FLY AS DRUG TRAFFICKERS TARGET PIGEONS

NEW DELHI -- PAKISTANI drug traffickers are using carrier pigeons to
smuggle more than UKP60m of heroin each year from Afghanistan.

Traffickers on both sides of the border use flocks of pigeons to carry
heroin to Pakistan, where many gangs which supply European dealers are based.

Afghan refugees are being paid to carry the pigeons packed in small cages
back into the border villages in the home country where makeshift drug
refineries are located in areas controlled by different Afghan warlords.

About 10gs of heroin are stuffed into a bullet-shaped tin capsule which is
then fastened to a pigeon's leg. Once the birds are released from
Afghanistan, they take between one and two hours to reach their lofts in
Pakistan, where the capsules are collected by traffickers.

One Karachi-based anti-drug campaigner, who asked not to be named, said:
"When the weather is good a pigeon is made to fly almost daily across the
border.

"In a month, an average Pakistani trafficker, who has between six and eight
homing pigeons, can smuggle across as much as 2kgs of heroin. This would be
worth about $300,000 [UKP190,000] in the European market."

He added that the biggest threat to the birds, which can evade anti-drugs
surveillance along the border, is being attacked by a bird of prey.

Traditionally, low-grade heroin is refined from Afghan opium. According to
the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), 50 new heroin
refineries began operating in eastern Afghanistan alone last year. Some of
these new refineries are capable of processing high-grade heroin and it is
believed that most of the heroin is being carried by pigeons.

According to a report compiled by Pakistani intelligence, there are at
least 300 pigeons currently engaged as heroin carriers in frontier
Pakistan, carrying about 500kgs of heroin across the border from
Afghanistan every year.

The semi-autonomous tribal territories where these drug traffickers and
their pigeon lofts are located, are outside Pakistani federal jurisdiction.
However, the smugglers still face the death penalty if they are caught.

According to Pakistan's Anti-Narcotics Force, drugs traffickers have
adopted a variety of new methods to carry on their trade in the face of
increased vigilance by the police.

Large, guarded convoys have been replaced by individuals or small groups of
people who carry across small consignments of heroin from Afghanistan.

Last February, a US State Department report said Afghanistan had retaken
its place as the world's leading producer of heroin, following the
overthrow of the Taliban regime which had banned cultivation of opium poppies.

Shipments of Afghan heroin and morphine are routed through Pakistan's
coastal areas to Turkey via Iran.

From there local traffickers arrange to send the shipments on to Europe
and the United States.

It is estimated that 80% of heroin in Europe comes from Afghanistan.

Last month, the head of Pakistan's anti-narcotics task force, Major General
Zafar Abbas, said heroin production in Afghanistan has been increasing
since the fall of the Taliban last year.

It is expected to reach more than 4,000 tonnes this year.