AFGHANISTAN'S NEW WAR ON DRUGS

More Than Two Decades Of War And Poverty Have Left A Generation Of Drug
Addicted Women

KABUL, Afghanistan -- An increasing number of Afghan women are turning to
drugs to help them cope with bereavement and displacement caused by 23
years of savage war, a recent survey has shown.

Afghanistan has long been known as one of the world's major producers of
opium. A recent U.N. study reports that opium production had reached 3,400
tonnes last year. But until relatively recently, it was not thought to have
a serious drug problem of its own among its own deeply religious and
conservative population.

However, a recent survey conducted by the Nejat Centre in Kabul, the only
organization treating drug addiction in the country, showed there were more
than 300 women addicts in the capital of Kabul alone. Most used opium,
although some were found to be addicted to hashish.

"We have already treated 100 addicted women, and are currently handling 20
other cases," said Shah Begum, who works at the centre. "We are also
treating some children born to addicted mothers."

Many of the women say they became addicted while living in the overcrowded
refugee camps across the border in Pakistan, where hundreds of thousands of
Afghans fled as war against the occupying Soviet army gave way to bitter
fighting among Islamic groups and finally to the five-year rule of the
hard-line Taliban.

"These women have not become addicted for pleasure," said Setaara, a worker
at the centre. "The main cause of their addiction is 23 years of war. Most
of them start using opium to help them cope with their problems, but over
time it becomes a habit."

For Sarwa, 50, the decision to seek treatment for her opium addiction was
not an easy one. "It will be very difficult for me to give it up," she
says. "I lost two sons and a young daughter during the various wars. My
home was destroyed by a rocket, forcing me to flee abroad with what
remained of my family. As a refugee I faced a lot of new problems, and in
order to forget them I started smoking opium."

Rona, 45, who recently returned from a refugee camp in Pakistan, also
blamed the wars for her addiction. "First, my 16-year-old nephew was
killed. Then, a year later, his mother and young sisters also died, and my
husband was seriously injured. To cope with all this I started smoking
opium at night. Now I eat it during the day as well," she says.

One woman at the centre who declined to give her name says she had been a
regular hashish user but decided to try opium on the advice of friends.

"After a while the effect of the drug wore off, and I needed more," she
says. "As a result I started suffering from insomnia. I took tablets for
that, but it didn't help, so I took up hashish again as well." She
acknowledges using what little money her sons could earn to support her
habit. When that proved insufficient, she started to sell off her household
belongings.

According to drug workers, the situation is much worse in Afghanistan's
conservative northern provinces, where many women support their families by
weaving carpets, and regularly give opium to their children to keep them
quiet while they work. The children quickly become as addicted as their
mothers. In the northern province of Badakhshan, a remote and mountainous
region close to the border with Tajikistan, there are an estimated 5,000
opium addicts.

There is only one 100-bed hospital located in Kabul that treats drug
addiction in all of Afghanistan. The facility is so badly overcrowded that
many patients are forced to sleep in the hospital's corridors. There are no
beds set aside to treat women.

For Afghan women seeking an end to their reliance on drugs and regain
control of their lives, the Nejat Center may be their only hope.