Afghan farmers, poppies and the USA
US uneasy with poppy buying proposal
NEW YORK, Apr 3 (Pajhwok Afghan News): Recent proposal from the European Union to "purchase poppies" from Afghan farmers, instead of it being sold to the Taliban, has found little support in the United States.
Officials of the European Union argue buying poppy from farmers at the same rate they sell it to the Taliban and then supplying it to pharmaceutical companies was the "best available solution" to the increasing opium menace in Afghanistan.
However, the US has not only opposed any such move, it has also shown signs of uneasiness. Afghanistan is the largest producer of illicit opium.
"The US is very uneasy with such a strategy. We do not support this," a senior State Department official told Pajhwok Afghan News. The US still supports the manual eradication of poppies, he observed.
One of the major reasons for this "uneasiness" and opposition is the fear among the US policymakers that the move would result in money landing into the hands of the Taliban and al-Qaeda.
"This would prove to be very damaging for our fight against terrorism," said the official, adding that as such, the United States would be opposing any such plan coming from any of its allies in Afghanistan.
Acknowledging that there was no visible short-term solution to this problem except for large scale manual eradication, the official said there needed to be a long term strategy, say 10 to 20 years. It is going to be a long battle against opium cultivation in Afghanistan.
Lalit K. Jha