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Afghanistan produces 90% of all opiate drugs in the world, but until recently was not a major consumer. Now, out of a population of 35 million, more than a million are addicted to drugs - proportionately the highest figure in the world. Right in the heart of Kabul, on the stony banks of the Kabul River, drug addicts gather to buy and use heroin. It's a place of misery and degradation. In broad daylight about a dozen men and teenage boys sit huddled in pairs smoking and injecting. Among them are some educated people - a doctor, an engineer and...

In Afghanistan, farmers grow poppy for opium, which is later processed into heroin and, ultimately, sold as heroin on the black market. How, when the Quran defines drugs as “the filth of Satan’s handiwork,” does the Islamic populace in Afghanistan justify growing this illicit crop? For one thing, the sale, but not consumption, of opium is acceptable to the locals because it is supposedly consumed by the West–by infidels–and thus furthers the war on them, outlines Gretchen Peters in her book Seeds of Terror: How Drugs, Thugs, and Crime Are Reshaping the Afghan War. Peters has worked for the Associated...

With deep condescension, my professors informed me that we live in a post-religious world. Religion, I was lectured, was the opiate of the people. I wondered, but never had the courage to suggest, that perhaps Marxism was the opiate of the elites.

April 14, 1999, Wednesday COMMITTEE HEARING SENATE FOREIGN RELATIONS: SUBCOMMITTEE ON NEAR EASTERN AND SOUTH U.S. SENATOR SAM BROWNBACK (R-KS) HOLDS HEARING ON THE CRISIS IN AFGANISTAN  WASHINGTON, D.C. SPEAKERS: U.S. SENATOR SAM BROWNBACK (R-KS), CHAIRMAN U.S. SENATOR JOHN ASHCROFT (R-MO) U.S. SENATOR GORDON H. SMITH (R-OR) U.S. SENATOR ROD GRAMS (R-MN) U.S. SENATOR CRAIG THOMAS (R-WY) U.S. SENATOR PAUL DAVID WELLSTONE (D-MN), RANKING MEMBER U.S. SENATOR ROBERT G. TORRICELLI (D-NJ) U.S. SENATOR PAUL S. SARBANES (D-MD) U.S. SENATOR CHRISTOPHER J. DODD (D-CT) U.S. REPRESENTATIVE DANA ROHRABACHER (R-CA) THE HONORABLE KARL F. INDERFURTH ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF STATE FOR SOUTH ...

WASHINGTON — When the U.S. State Department announced this week that it finally is going to designate the Haqqani network as a foreign terrorist organization, it was a nonevent for most of our countrymen. That's because few Americans know how deadly the organization is. For that we can thank those at Foggy Bottom who are wedded to the naive hope of a near-term "diplomatic breakthrough" in Afghanistan. Couple that misguided belief with the Obama administration's self-deception that the radical Islamic jihad against the West ended with the demise of Osama bin Laden and it's understandable why the Haqqani network...

When opium was cheaper than whiskey – and Great Britain waged a "wicked" drug war When Opium Was Cheaper Than Whiskey - and Great Britain waged a "wicked" drug war The bottles have a beautiful aqua color to them. If you hold them up to the light, rainbows fire across the delicate patina. But their beauty belies the deadly reality behind the delicate hues. The bottles once held opium based "elixirs," such as Dr. McMunn's Elixir of Opium, most claiming to be a cure for a host of ailments, including the relief of "convulsions and spasmodic action," as well as...

Production of opium and the illicit crop's value soared in Afghanistan last year, the United Nations said in a report released Thursday. According to the UN's Office on Drugs and Crime, farmer income derived from Afghanistan's opium crop in 2011 was $1.4 billion (1.09 billion euros), representing nine percent of GDP. "Opium is therefore a significant part of the Afghan economy and provides considerable funding to the insurgency and fuels corruption," Yury Fedotov, executive director of the UN office, said in a statement. Afghanistan grows about 90 percent of the world's opium. The UN said poppy-crop cultivation covered more than...

After 10 years of war, Afghanistan remains the world’s leading opium supplier, responsible for 90 percent of the global supply. Opium cultivation rose by 7 percent in 2011 compared with last year. Opium production also climbed 61 percent this year. A crop blight destroyed much of Afghanistan’s opium harvest last year causing a decrease in opium production and creating a simultaneous spike in prices. Higher prices led to much speculation that more Afghan farmers would turn to the crop this year, which has indeed proved to be the case. UN officials estimate that 10 percent of opium harvest proceeds reach...

Fort Bragg Suspect Wanted in Second Murder, Was Growing Opium PoppiesBy Jay Barmann in News on August 31, 2011 2:30 PM Aaron Bassler, suspected of shooting Fort Bragg city councilman Jere Melo last Saturday, remains at large, and now his father has come forward to tell reporters that his son is schizophrenic, and that he was likely responsible for a second murder that occurred 30 miles away on August 11. James Bassler says his son had refused psychiatric treatment, and had moved into the woods after going broke four months ago. Furthermore, investigators have found two small poppy fields in...

Let Me Push Certain Individuals Buttons Fox News will air a Oliver North special on Special Ops, probably because of the Osama bin Laden operation in Pakistan. Part of the program will cover the U.S. DEA in Afghanistan and a mission to go after the Opium drug profits used by the Taliban. The Poppy Fields of Afghanistan supply the raw materials used to make Opium. How ironic. Oliver North is one of the principals involved in Drug Running during the Iran / Contra operations in Central America. The profits from those drugs illegally funded the weapons smuggling for that war...

Helmand is the largest cultivator of poppies in Afghanistan with just under 173,000 acres of the 346,000 acres) of arable land in the province dedicated to the crop.The next largest producer is neighbouring Kandahar province with about 50,000 acres under cultivation.To promote alternative livelihoods to growing poppies the food programme last year distributed wheat seed, fertiliser and grape vines to some 65,000 farmers across Helmand.Eradication actually increased this year, up from 3,645 acres last year to 3,959 acres this year.Police supported by military and civilian mentors from the UK, seized 5,000kg of opium, 155kg of heroin and 12,000kg of precursor...

More than $3 billion in cash has been openly flown out of Kabul International Airport in the past three years, a sum so large that U.S. investigators believe top Afghan officials and their associates are sending billions of diverted U.S. aid and logistics dollars and drug money to financial safe havens abroad. The cash -- packed into suitcases, piled onto pallets and loaded into airplanes -- is declared and legal to move. But U.S. and Afghan officials say they are targeting the flows in major anticorruption and drug trafficking investigations because of their size relative to Afghanistan's small economy and...

KABUL -- For rent: a four-story, 11-bedroom dwelling of pink granite and lime marble, complete with massage showers, a rooftop fountain and, in the basement, an Asian-themed nightclub. Price: $12,000 a month.It's a relative bargain in Kabul's version of Beverly Hills. There's a war on, but carnival-colored mansions are mushrooming alongside cratered streets and sewage streams. Vast outdoor chandeliers, heated indoor pools and acres of mirrored, skyscraper glass windows abound. The grandiose houses, derided here as narco-tecture, have become the most obvious symbols of Afghanistan's corruption, which is fueled both by an enormous influx of U.S. dollars and by the...

Soldiers from 1st Battalion The Duke of Lancaster's Regiment handed out 20 new tractors to farming co-operatives in the Nad 'Ali region of Helmand province.To qualify for the equipment, the co-operatives had to show that they were willing to stop sowing poppy crops.

KABUL (AFP) – As the pink poppy fields of southern Afghanistan yield their sticky harvest, opium production in the country that supplies the world with heroin is set to fall, farmers and officials say. That's good news for the fight against the multi-billion-dollar drugs trade but it could be bad news for Afghan farmers struggling to feed their families as the war against Taliban insurgents and drugs gangs escalates. "This year we had less poppy cultivation, which I think was because of our public awareness campaign which we launched before cultivation started," said Gul Mohammad, head of the counter-narcotics department...

LASHKAR GAH -- Aziz Ahmad is a deeply worried man. With two wives and seven children at home, the 30-year-old farmer depends entirely on his opium-poppy crop to make a living. This year, it's proving to be an increasingly difficult task. First, falling water tables stunted his crop. Then a mysterious blight emerged to destroy most of what remained. In a normal growing season, Ahmad's 4-hectare plot in the Washer district of Afghanistan's southern Helmand Province yields 100 kilograms of opium -- enough to cover his debts and ensure his family's survival over the winter. This year he managed to...

SNIPPET: "According to the report, the funds, from IRGC opium sales, reached the Bahraini minister from Colombia, eastern China, and Azerbaijan, and were transferred to Europe. According to the report, Ali Jannati, the son of senior Iranian Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati , is also involved; he is Iranian Ambassador to Kuwait."

NEAR MARJAH, Afghanistan – U.S. and Afghan soldiers linked up with Marines on the outskirts of the Taliban stronghold of Marjah on Thursday, sealing off escape routes and setting the stage for what is being described as the biggest offensive of the nine-year war. Taliban defenders repeatedly fired rockets and mortars at units poised in foxholes along the edge of the town, apparently trying to lure NATO forces into skirmishes before the big attack. "They're trying to draw us in," said Capt. Joshua Winfrey, 30, of Tulsa, Okla., commander of Lima Company, 3rd Battalion, 6th Marines. Up to 1,000 militants...

LASHKAR GAH, Afghanistan (AFP) – Afghan men, women and children fearing imminent fighting between the Taliban and US troops, loaded up trucks on Monday and streamed out of one of the world's main sources of heroin. Wrapped in blankets to fend off the winter chill, families packed up goats, furniture and clothes, clogging roads with taxis, cars and tractors in a major exodus to safety, dodging roadside bombs planted to kill US and NATO troops. "We left the area because lots of aircraft were flying over and lots of forces were moving back and forth," Shir Ali Khan told AFP...

The purpose of FreeRepublic.com's multiple message boards is to limit the topics for each board to particular topics. Posting the same message on all the boards defeats the purpose of multiple-boards for special topics. It is very annoying to see the same message on every bulletin board. PLEASE! DO THE READERS A FAVOR. STOP CROSS-POSTING YOUR MESSAGES!

WASHINGTON, Jan. 11, 2010 – Forces have uncovered numerous weapons caches and large amounts of narcotics during operations in Afghanistan over the past few days. Today, an international force discovered one ton of opium in the back of a vehicle during a patrol in Helmand province. The driver and two passengers were seen hiding the vehicle behind a sand dune and fled on foot. They threw an assault rifle in nearby bushes. Troops caught the men and placed them in custody. The drugs were destroyed. In other operations today: -- An international force discovered a cache of 320 large-caliber machine...

Note: The following text is a quote: DEA Mourns the Loss of Three DEA Special Agents in Afghanistan OCT 26 - WASHINGTON, DC – The United States Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) today confirmed that three Special Agents were killed during a counternarcotics mission in Afghanistan. “Today, the Drug Enforcement Administration mourns the tragic loss of three DEA Special Agents and seven U.S. service members killed in a helicopter crash in Afghanistan,” said Acting Administrator Michele M. Leonhart. “The incident occurred during the early morning hours of October 26, when these heroic individuals were returning from a completed, joint counternarcotics mission.”...

KABUL, Afghanistan (CNN) -- Afghanistan's opium production dropped dramatically this year partly because of new aggressive drug-fighting tactics in the country, a United Nations study found. According to the report from the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime, production dipped by 10 percent this year, while cultivation fell by 22 percent. "At a time of pessimism about the situation in Afghanistan, these results are a welcome piece of good news and demonstrate that progress is possible," said Antonio Maria Costa, the office's executive director. The United Nations notes that drugs originating in Afghanistan have "catastrophic consequences." "They fund the activities...

DORRIS, Calif. -- Agents from the Siskiyou County-Wide Narcotic Task Force were assisted by the California Department of Justice, Siskiyou County Sheriff’s Department and California Highway Patrol in the service of a search warrant at the Elm Motel in Dorris, California. Drug agents learned that a shipment of opium had been intercepted by U.S. Customs en route from Thailand on its way to the Elm Motel in Dorris on Highway 97, just south of the California Oregon border. The opium had been hidden in the hollow handles of broomsticks that were mixed in with baskets and bamboo items. Drug agents...

The Pentagon has put 50 of Afghanistan’s powerful opium barons on a “kill or capture” list, signalling a radical shift in tactics against the Taleban. The announcement came as the commander of US forces in Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal, admitted that the insurgency, nurtured by tens of millions of dollars from the country’s vast poppy fields, now held the upper hand. The existence of the “joint integrated prioritised target list” — a rogues’ gallery of drug lords who are earmarked for arrest or assassination — is revealed in an unpublished Senate report obtained yesterday by The Times. It was confirmed...

In dozens of mountain hamlets in this remote corner of Afghanistan, opium addiction has become so entrenched that whole families — from toddlers to old men — are addicts. From just one family years ago, at least half the people of Sarab, population 1,850, are now addicts. Afghanistan supplies nearly all the world's opium, the raw ingredient used to make heroin. "I am ashamed of what I have become," says Beg, an unwashed turban curled on his head. "I've lost my self-respect. I've lost my values. I take the food from this child to pay for my opium," he says,...

SHAHRAN, Afghanistan — For as long as anyone can remember, there was no need for paper money in this remote corner of the Hindu Kush. The common currency was what grew in everyone's backyard - opium. When children felt like buying candy, they ran into their father's fields and returned with a few grams of opium folded inside a leaf. Their mothers collected it in plastic bags, trading 18 grams for a meter of fabric or two liters of cooking oil. Even a visit to the barbershop could be settled in opium. But the economy of this village sputtered to...

Note: The following text is a quote: July 30, 2009 ANOTHER DEAD IMU DRUG RUNNER Both Reuters and AFP report the recent demise of Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan activist Nemet Azizov in a firefight with Tajik forces in the Rasht valley. Mr. Azizov was allegedly involved in the production and/or trafficking of heroin produced from opium grown in nearby Afghanistan. Posted on 30 July 2009 @ 20:14 GMT

KABUL, Afghanistan, July 29 (UPI) -- The United States' top anti-drug agency will substantially boost its presence in Afghanistan to check opium trafficking, the Taliban's main revenue source. "One year ago, we had 13 personnel in Afghanistan working counternarcotics," Jay Fitzpatrick, the DEA's assistant regional director based in Kabul. "We're in the process of increasing the number of personnel to 81." The U.S. network reported the DEA also plans track the top 10 to 20 narcotics traffickers in Afghanistan with the help of Afghan authorities.

Commentary: WASHINGTON, July 10 (UPI) -- The outgoing NATO SACEUR, or supreme allied commander Europe, would gladly forgo more NATO troops to fight Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan if allied countries dropped their caveats against their use in combat operations. Gen. John Craddock, the outgoing supremo, says these caveats "increase the risk to every service member deployed in Afghanistan and bring increased risk to mission success." They are also "a detriment to effective command and control, unity of effort and … command." NATO's International Security Assistance Force consists of 58,300 troops from 41 countries. But NATO's 28 member nations provide the...

Obama’s First Order: Don’t Hurt the Heroin byPaul L. Williams, Ph.D.thelastcrusade.org Obama's agenda; Narco-Nation Building Hey, guys, don’t pick the poppies. That’s the order from the Obama Administration to the 4,000 Marines presently engaged in Operation Khanjar or “Strike of the Sword,” an invasion of the Taliban infested Helmand Province in southern Afghanistan. The Marines of Bravo’s Company 1st Platoon sleep beside groves of poppies Troops of the 2nd Platoon walk through the fields on strict orders not to swat the heavy opium bulbs. The Afghan farmers and laborers, who are engaged in scraping the resin from the bulbs, smile...

TRIESTE, Italy (Reuters) - Washington is to dramatically overhaul its Afghan anti-drug strategy, phasing out opium poppy eradication, the U.S. envoy to Pakistan and Afghanistan told allies on Saturday. Richard Holbrooke, attending a G8 conference on stabilizing Afghanistan, also discussed efforts to support its August 20 election. Washington has nearly doubled its troops to combat a growing Taliban insurgency and provide security for the vote. "The Western policies against the opium crop, the poppy crop, have been a failure. They did not result in any damage to the Taliban, but they put farmers out of work," Holbrooke told Reuters after...

The United States is to change the way it deals with the massive poppy growing industry in Afghanistan. Instead of destroying the crops it will spend money encouraging Afghan farmers to grow different ones. US special envoy to Afghanistan Richard Holbrooke, at a G8 meeting in Italy, said current measures against poppy growers had been "a failure". The conference of foreign ministers in Trieste also called for credible elections in Afghanistan in August. Mr Holbrooke said that existing programmes of eradication had not reduced by one dollar the amount of money the Taliban earned from production. "Spraying the crops just...

Australian wallabies are eating opium poppies and creating crop circles as they hop around "as high as a kite", a government official has said. Lara Giddings, the attorney general for the island state of Tasmania, said the kangaroo-like marsupials were getting into poppy fields grown for medicine. She was reporting to a parliamentary hearing on security for poppy crops. Australia supplies about 50% of the world's legally-grown opium used to make morphine and other painkillers. We have a problem with wallabies entering poppy fields, getting as high as a kite and going around in circles. Then they crash Lara Giddings,...

Wallabies are getting high on opium from poppy fields and flattening crops, an Australian official has said. The marsupials have been snacking on poppies growing in fields in Tasmania, the world's largest producer of legally-grown optium for medicines. Afterwards, they hop round in circles before crashing on top of the crops and trampling them to the ground. State attorney general Lara Giddings told a parliamentary hearing: "We have a problem with wallabies entering poppy fields, getting as high as a kite and going around in circles. "Then they crash. We see crop circles in the poppy industry from wallabies that...

Stoned wallabies causing crop circles Tasmanian wallabies are getting stoned on the state's opium poppy crops and creating crop circles. Things are really hopping in Tasmania where wallabies are getting stoned on the state's opium poppy crops and creating crop circles. The wallabies are breaking into the poppy fields and making the circles while they're high. Rick Rockliff from Tasmanian Alkaloids says wildlife and livestock which eat the poppies are known to act weird, and he's told the Hobart Mercury there's been many stories about sheep eating the poppies and then walking around in circles. Tasmania is the world's largest...

WASHINGTON, June 17, 2009 – Afghan security forces, assisted by coalition forces, confiscated an opium cache and captured several armed enemy fighters in the southern province of Kandahar today and captured a Taliban commander in an earlier operation, military officials reported. In the Kandahar engagement, the security forces were attacked in the Chenartu Valley by enemy fighters with small-arms fire. The combined patrol returned fire and called in air support on the enemy positions. At the site, forces recovered 30 pounds of opium and captured several armed militants. The combined security forces are in the area conducting multi-day clearing operations,...

'Record' Afghanistan drugs bust International and Afghan troops have killed 60 militants and made a record drugs haul in an operation in southern Afghanistan, the US military has said.

WASHINGTON, May 12, 2009 – Afghan and coalition forces captured two drug traffickers, seized about a half ton of opium, and captured three other suspects in separate overnight operations in Afghanistan. In the Musa Qaleh district of Helmand province, Afghan forces, advised by coalition forces, detained the drug traffickers and opium early today. The combined forces found nearly 1,000 pounds of black-tar opium during a search of a suspected militant’s home. A suspected drug trafficker and an armed accomplice were found in the house and detained without resistance. The suspected trafficker is believed to have ties with people who use...

WASHINGTON, May 8, 2009 – Afghan forces, advised by coalition forces, confiscated 600 pounds of opium and killed seven armed militants last night during operations in the Nahr-e Saraj district of Afghanistan’s Helmand province. Prompted by local reports of Taliban activities in the area, the Afghan forces launched a search of compounds in a known insurgent safe haven and narcotics hub. The Afghan-led force found the opium, an AK-47 assault rifle with 1,000 rounds and remote-controlled bomb-making components during the search. The Afghan forces also found a trauma room fully stocked with medical supplies and ready to treat militant casualties....

LANCASTER [CALIFORNIA] - Poppies popped up Wednesday at Lancaster City Park. So did painted antelopes and ferocious-looking dinosaurs - all in preparation for this weekend's annual California Poppy Festival. "We've been planting poppy plants all week and will be planting about 500 plants today," said Jeff Campbell, recreation supervisor for Lancaster's Parks, Recreation and Arts Department. "And we'll probably be planting through Friday. "The tents for the festival started going up Monday and have been going up non-stop every day so far this week," Campbell said. "All told, we'll have about 175 tents. In the northwest area of the festival...

WASHINGTON, March 31 (UPI) -- Attempting to eradicate poppy fields in Afghanistan is counterproductive, the United States' top envoy to the country says. Even though U.S. President Barack Obama's new strategy for Afghanistan calls for continued efforts to destroy the flowers used in the production of opium, Richard Holbrooke, the administration's coordinator of Afghanistan policy, called the practice "wasteful and ineffective" at a Brussels forum this month, USA Today reported Tuesday. Moves to eradicate poppies have been "pushing farmers into the Taliban's hands" because it destroys their livelihoods, Holbrooke reportedly said.

Can pomegranates cut into the Talibans opium trade in Afghanistan? When I first heard this proposal, I thought it was a crazy idea. Now, I am not so sure. Pomegranates yield more then $2000 per acre than opium. The supporters of this proposal claim pomegranate farmers never return to growing opium. The downside is pomegranates are more difficult to transport in dangerous Afghanistan and the trees take 4~5 years to mature. The US Government is putting $12 million into publicizing the proposal. Video is here.

DUSHANBE, Tajik Drug Control Agency (DCA) chief Rustam Nazarov noted that according to the Afghan counternarcotics service, 7,700 tons of raw opium were produced in Afghanistan last year, 500 tons fewer than 2007. He noted that last year showed an increase in narcotics production in Afghan provinces not controlled by the central government. “The provinces uncontrolled by the central government now produce some 80 percent of Afghan narcotics,” said the Tajik drug control chief, “18 provinces in Afghanistan have been announced narcotics-free; three of these – Takhor, Balkh and Kunduz - border Tajikistan.” He added that production of narcotics in...

1st Video of N. Korean Poppy Fields Unveiled DECEMBER 09, 2008 07:45 The first video clip on poppies growing en masse in a district controlled by the North Korean military in Taehung, South Pyongan Province, was unveiled yesterday. The Citizens Coalition for Human Rights of Abductees and North Korean Refugees, a Seoul-based civic group, released the 20-minute clip at a digital video exhibition for North Korean human rights at Gwanggyo Gallery in Seoul, saying it confirms the North Korean military-led “white bellflower project” as claimed by North Korean defectors. The clip, which the group said it received from a spy...

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan -- Under a wine-colored burqa that flows from the crown of her head down over her body, Khadija sat cross-legged, spinning the wheel of a sewing machine and methodically stitching a seam into a flowing stream of white cloth. The 42-year-old mother of five was working to burn off a consuming and deadly habit that again is blooming across Afghanistan. Until a few days ago, Khadija, who like many Afghans uses only one name, slipped opium in her tea twice a day to combat depression. It was," Khadija said, "more important than food." Just as the Taliban have...

On March 1, 2006, I met Hamid Karzai for the first time. It was a clear, crisp day in Kabul. The Afghan president joined President and Mrs. Bush, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Ambassador Ronald Neumann to dedicate the new United States Embassy. He thanked the American people for all they had done for Afghanistan. I was a senior counternarcotics official recently arrived in a country that supplied 90 percent of the world’s heroin. I took to heart Karzai’s strong statements against the Afghan drug trade. That was my first mistake. Over the next two years I would discover...

New York, NY (AHN) - Taliban militants have earned an estimated $100 million from "taxes" generated from farmers growing poppies for the opium trade in Afghanistan, the head of the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime, Antonio Maria Costa, said Tuesday. Acosta said the earnings do not include money coming from other opium-related activities. He said the extremists may have earned more in protecting laboratories and the transport of the illegal drug. He told the BBC, "One is protection to laboratories and the other is that the insurgents offer protection to cargo, moving opium across the border." The U.N. estimates...

THE world's biggest drug bust has been executed by narcotics agents in Afghanistan, who say they uncovered 236 tonnes of hashish hidden in trenches in the south of the country. The massive haul, found in the southern province of Kandahar on Monday, was worth more than $US400 million ($426 million) and would have netted the Taliban about $US14 million in profits, NATO officials said yesterday. It weighed as much as 30 double-decker London buses. "To our knowledge, this was the biggest drug seizure in the world," said Afghanistan's deputy interior minister Abdul Hadi Khalid. He said the drugs were found...

Afghan farmers hope to capitalise on soaring food costs by growing wheat instead of poppy crops, with the fall in heroin prices further fuelling the switch. The price of a tonne of wheat in Afghanistan has almost trebled this year, causing acute food shortages. A changeover of crops has begun in key agricultural regions, said Tekeste Tekie, country representative for the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation. He said a significant increase in wheat crops is expected from next year's harvest. "The high price of commodities has encouraged farmers to switch from poppy cultivation to wheat. In fact, we are already...