Afghan Leader Urges Action On Drugs

KABUL, Afghanistan — President Karzai criticized leading Western nations yesterday for what he said was their failure to cooperate in tackling soaring opium production in Afghanistan.

Mr. Karzai's comments came two days after an annual report by the U.N. Office of Drugs and Crime showed an explosion in opium production in the insurgency-wracked country, which now accounts for 93% of overall world production of the crop, which is used to make heroin.

"There is not enough cooperation among the members of the international community in the fight against drugs in Afghanistan," Mr. Karzai told a gathering of government, tribal, and religious leaders as well as international representatives. "We will not be successful if the international community does not respect our thoughts and ideas."

Mr. Karzai did not elaborate, but he asked local leaders at the meeting to use their influence to try to end opium poppy farming.

Afghanistan has opium growing on 477,000 acres of land, a 17% increase from last year's record 408,000 acres, according to the annual Unodc survey. While 13 provinces in the relatively stable north are now poppy free — up from six last year — production in the insurgency-wracked south has surged to unprecedented levels. "Wherever the government is present [the drug fight] is successful, but where the government is overshadowed, it is not successful," Mr. Karzai said.