Free Republic

Faltering British efforts to tackle Afghanistan's poppy crop have found an unlikely ally – in the weather. is expected to reduce parts of the country's opium harvest drastically. Scientists believe freezing winter temperatures followed by late rains and a possible drought may cut this year's yields, with some farmers losing half of their crop. The fierce winter cold – which claimed hundreds of lives across Afghanistan – is thought to have stopped millions of poppy seeds from germinating. Late rains have then stunted many of the plants that survived.

Out on Lancaster's west side sits the Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve. Downtown, at the State Parks Mojave Desert Information Center, senior park aide Judy Elgin fields phone call after phone call inquiring about the reserve. "Almost every call we get this time of the year is, 'Are there poppies yet?' When I tell them there are no poppies yet, some people are really disappointed," Elgin said. However, since Wednesday, Elgin doesn't have to disappoint callers - the reserve has its first poppy of the season. The 1,800-acre reserve, on Lancaster Road (Avenue I) at approximately 150th Street West, might...

Villagers in remote areas of Badakhshan Province, north-eastern Afghanistan, have been using opium as a substitute for medicine for years. They are oblivious to the harm it can do to their health. There is no official data about the number of drug addicts in Badakhshan. However, the United Nations Office for Drugs and Crimes (UNODC) says one million people are addicted to drugs there, 45,000 of whom are women. This video short shows a women’s opium smoking session in the village of Jukhan, tucked away in mountainous Badakhshan. While efforts are being made to rehabilitate drug addicts in the village,...

Southern provinces are the source of most Afghan poppy production Opium poppy production in Afghanistan reached another record high last year and Kabul must do more to stop it, a US State Department report says.The report says that the poppy cultivation helps Taleban insurgents obtain money and weapons. The drug trade hinders progress towards economic stability and democracy, the report adds. Afghanistan grows nearly all of the world's opium poppy crop in an illegal trade worth billions of dollars. "Eliminating narcotics cultivation and trafficking in Afghanistan will require a long-term national and international commitment," said the State Department. "The...

The vast majority of "high value targets" for U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agents in Afghanistan are tied to the Taliban, which is using the country's rampant opium poppy cultivation to fund terrorist insurgencies. "We must make it clear to the Afghan people that we, the international community and the Afghan government are serious about this drug trade and corresponding terrorism," said Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, Florida Republican and ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. "We are not just eradicating a few opium fields or arresting some local, midlevel drug dealers to show something is being done, but that is...

The problem with poppies - What to do with the plants that kill more than pain Colby Cosh - September 17, 2007 One of the troubling things about NATO's war in Afghanistan is that there continues to be major disagreement between the allies over one of the most important proximate war aims: namely, the interception of funds from opium poppies being used to bankroll guerrilla operations of the Taliban. Not everyone agrees with the U.S.'s determination--reiterated in a State Department policy document Aug. 9--to pursue a policy of poppy eradication through on-the-ground violence and aerial spraying. European governments point out...

52 REASONS NOT TO MOW 37 WAYS TO HELP TREES Please download with 100% cotton, rice, recycled, or scrap paper Ron Howard, director of A Beautiful Mind and many other films,made his first film at age 8.. an anti mowing film which showed the nature of mowers' attacks on lawns. Art Buchwald: People shouldn't be judged by the length of their grass. In 2003 through now, the world has seen floods, famine, fire, mudslides, hurricanes, tornados and other disasters created by the unprecedented destruction of trees around the world. Trees are nature's weather stabilizers. We need trillions of trees.. new...

THESE ARE THE SENATORS WHO VOTED TO GIVE SOCIAL SECURITY BENEFITS TO ILLEGAL ALIENS REGARDLESS OF POLITICAL PARTY, THESE POLITICIANS NEED TO BE DEFEATED IN 2006, 2008 OR 2010, WHENEVER THEY NEXT COME UP FOR OFFICE. SEND THIS TO EVERYONE YOU KNOW; THE ENTIRE POPULATION OF THE UNITED STATES NEEDS TO KNOW THIS INFORMATION -- THAT IS, UNLESS THEY DO NOT MIND SHARING THEIR SOCIAL SECURITY WITH FOREIGN WORKERS WHO NEVER PAID INTO IT AND AMERICAN CITIZENS ARE BEING LEFT OUT. Grouped by Home State Alabama: Alaska: Stevens (R-AK), Yea Arizona: McCain (R-AZ), Yea Arkansas: Lincoln (D-AR), Yea Pryor (D-AR),...

I am curious why none of the media covers the most important aspect of the Malvo shootings. If you look at Newspapers on the dates when the shootings are underway you discover something I find quite interesting. The shootings begin to dominate the news the day before the debate on the Iraq war starts and they catch them the day after the declaration of war??? If you ask most people "do you remember the debate about starting the second Iraq war", they will all answer "yes of course". But if you followup with the question "name one point in the...

I recently received a reply to a post that stated: "This should be beneath a "freeper". Sad." So I asked.. what is it that makes a FReeper? My reply (and I will admit was tasteless) was also questioning. It stirred controversy and was removed? Why Moderators? Can you not tell me? Did it not meet with your "FReeper" mentality? According to all posted guidelines it should be listed but no, you chose to delete it. Yes.. I'm the first one IBTZ, I'm sure you'll nick me for speaking up..

<p>I received a a small FLower.. Which I now hold in my hand. I am weeping at the sight of it.</p> <p>Please bare with me my friends....the tears are becoming public. I want to ...ah crap... I can,t go on!</p>

Afghanistan will encourage its powerful drug lords to invest their illegally earned profits back into the war-shattered country, according to the governor of the nation’s top opium growing region. The offer comes amid warnings of another bumper poppy crop that will fuel a booming narcotics trade that already accounts for 35 per cent of the impoverished nation’s income. "We as a government will provide them the opportunity to use their money for the national benefit," said Helmand Gov. Moham-med Daud during a two-day trip this week to the region by United States Ambassador Ronald Neumann. "They must invest in industries....

Vets win right to sell poppies in post officesSteve Lambert Canadian Press November 03, 2005 CREDIT: Ottawa Citizen - Pam Champagne (right) is shown adjusting a poppy on Ernie Pelletier's blazer as the Bells Corners Legion poppy campaign was kicked off. WINNIPEG -- Veterans have won a battle far removed from the front lines of Europe, Asia and Africa. They've gained the right to sell poppies inside Canada Post offices across the country. The Royal Canadian Legion's annual poppy campaign got off to a rocky start in the northern Manitoba town of The Pas last week when veterans were told...

On a weekend when many Tucsonans are camping in the mountains or partying at poolside, Dan Hawkins has been standing outside a supermarket in 100-degree heat, clutching a fistful of memories that seem to grow dimmer each year. There was a time when passers-by eagerly scooped up the scarlet Buddy Poppies Hawkins has peddled each Memorial Day weekend since 1987. Nowadays, there are far fewer takers for the bright red flowers that recall America's fallen troops. "It used to be a big thing," said Hawkins, 72, a Vietnam veteran and leader of the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 7399. "Pretty...

Many argue that communism will never be possible because of "human nature". The essence of this false argument is the belief that a communist society would consist of an all-powerful central government that would tell everybody what to do--and would therefore undermine the creative initiative of individuals and the search for happiness. • This argument is based on two false assumptions: (1) It assumes that a communist society will look like the former Soviet Union, or the current China, North Korea, etc (ie: corrupt police states with a feudal-style ruling class) (2) It assumes that people will only work in...

LANCASTER - The hills were awake and vibrant over the Easter weekend with gold, purple and yellow hues accenting the outskirts of the Antelope Valley. Thousands went to the California Poppy Reserve on Sunday to get a close-up view of California's official flower. According to attendance records, more than 2,000 cars went through the front gates Friday and Saturday. Saturday's attendance was the greatest so far this year, with 1,342 cars coming in. Sunday's attendance was expected to surpass Saturday's. The numbers are the minimum because the parking lot at the reserve filled to capacity at least three times Sunday....

LANCASTER - A Viking ship and Egyptian antiquities are some of the new attractions at the 14th annual California Poppy Festival, scheduled for Saturday and Sunday, April 16 and 17 at Lancaster City Park. The award-winning festival's theme is "Always Something New." "The goal each year is that we have to do something different, because there has to be a reason for people to come," said Bob Greene, assistant Parks, Recreation and Arts director. Viking fans - those of the Nordic raiders and not the Randy Moss-less football team - may delight in a handmade 27-foot wooden replica of a...

LANCASTER - The Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve is open and ready for visitors. State park officials opened the reserve on March 5, the earliest it has opened for full operation since 1976. "All kinds of people are coming," said Judy Elgin, a senior park aide with Mojave Desert State Parks. This year's California poppy crop is especially big and bright, a result perhaps of the blossoms receiving more nutrients that allow them to grow better, Elgin added. In addition, many other wildflowers are in bloom such as owl's clover, lupines and cream cups. Wildflower displays are expected to peak...

VIENNA The United Nations has warned that Afghanistan's 10 most powerful drug warlords could join forces in a Colombian-style cartel capable of turning the country into a narcotics state. "There are now 10 main operators in Afghanistan, and the single unifying factor is control of the opium trade," said Antonio Maria Costa, executive director of the Vienna-based United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. "The opium trade is the one factor that unites the ethnic groups," Costa added in an interview Friday as top anti-narcotics experts met to discuss ways to stem the increase in opium cultivation in Afghanistan. (Snip)...

KANAI, Afghanistan - Abdullah, a black-turbaned shepherd, said he was watching over his sheep one night in early February when he heard a plane pass low overhead three times. By morning his eyes were so swollen he could not open them and the sheep around him were dying in convulsions. Although farmers had noticed a white powder on their crops, they cut grass and clover for their animals and picked spinach to eat anyway. Within hours the animals were severely ill, people here said, and the villagers complained of fevers, skin rashes and bloody diarrhea. The children were particularly affected....

LANCASTER - In a good year, blankets of bright orange poppies brighten the hilly landscape each spring that makes up the Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve. A few years ago more than 100,000 visitors traveled to the 1,745-acre state reserve, located 15 miles west of Lancaster in the Antelope Buttes, attracted by the California state flower. If the weather remains cool, this spring's flower blooms could be at their best sometime in March or April, state park officials say. But a proposed plan by Oregon-based PPM Energy, a subsidiary of ScottishPower, to erect a wind farm near the reserve could...

World To U.S.: Don't Spray Poppies KABUL, Afghanistan, Jan. 31, 2005 Leading relief groups urged the United States to reconsider its strategy to counter Afghanistan's illegal narcotics industry, the world's largest, warning that destroying farmers opium crops could wreck the country's post-Taliban recovery. In an open letter to U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, more than 20 aid organizations active in Afghanistan said "premature and excessive" crop eradication could create such uproar that planned help for farmers cannot be delivered. "Massive eradication efforts in 2005 could risk destabilizing large areas of the country, thereby undermining critical alternative livelihood and law...

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AP) - Two men opened fire on government troops destroying opium poppy crops in central Afghanistan Thursday, killing one soldier before both gunmen also were fatally shot, an official said. The gunmen attacked a group of 50 militia soldiers as they worked in a poppy field near Deh Rawood in Uruzgan province, Gov. Jan Mohammed Khan said. A second soldier was wounded in the ensuing gunbattle. Khan claimed both assailants were known Taliban supporters, but didn't elaborate. He said the poppy eradication effort in his province would go on. President Hamid Karzai, with strong American backing, has vowed...

TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ FRIDAY, DECEMBER 24, 2004 04:55:55 AM ] NEW DELHI: The failure of the US to put an end to the reign of druglords in Afgha-nistan may cost India dearly. The sharp increase in opium cultivation in Afgha-nistan by a whopping 60% over the last one year is giving sleepless nights to Indian drug enforcement agencies. The concern stems from the fact that most of the consignments of heroin seized in India in recent months originated in the war-ravaged Afghanistan and found their way into the country though the Indo-Pak border along Punjab. "It's an alarming situation since...

Kabul (AsiaNews) – Roses instead of poppies will blossom in Afghanistan, the world’s leading producer of opium. More than a hundred farmers in south-eastern province Ningharhar have in fact decided to give up illegal poppy cultivation and grow roses instead. Rose oil, a key ingredient in perfume, could thus replace opium, this thanks to a project promoted by German NGO Agro Action and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). This fall, some 40,000 roses from Bulgaria will be planted in a 10 hectare area. Another 90,000 will be next spring as part of the project. Total cost will be...

Editorial | Afghanistan's Poppy Trade A war worth fighting vigorously While arguments continue over which presidential contender can win the "war on terror," not enough is being said about another "war" on one of its battlefields. In Afghanistan, long a focal point and problem spot of the "war on drugs," the situation has gotten worse. The U.S. State Department reports that Afghanistan is on pace to produce a record opium poppy crop this year. Afghanistan is already estimated by the United Nations to produce three-quarters of the world's opium. The $2.3 billion trade is responsible for half of the poor...

why do people keep banning me everytime I put up interesting articles? I work for a website I think some of you are familiar with called phantirath weekly world news and each time we put somthing up on FR no matter how conservative it is it keeps getting banned. Whats the matter with it?! Damn man what are you marxist socialists communists? I just got a call this mroning from a Juwish friend of mine who said that you banned an important article about Zionism and Noam Federman and about how we were to support israel. I thought you guys...

SOME countries need to be seen from the air. On the flight from Kabul to Herat, mountains stretch away on every side. In the midday heat, they are molten yellow before turning ochre in the late afternoon and purple with the twilight. It is a rock landscape of great geological antiquity, in which humanity seems a recent and transient presence. This is not only due to the aesthetic unworthiness of the human race in the midst of such primeval grandeur. The high places of Afghanistan are as inhospitable as they are beautiful. In the few valley bottoms, there is greenery....

MOSCOW -- Worldwide opium production is increasing, driven by a sharp rise in poppy cultivation in Afghanistan, the United Nations said Friday in a report released in Russia, one of the prime routes for Afghan opium and heroin reaching the West. Opium poppy cultivation declined in two major producing countries, Myanmar and Laos, the 2004 World Drug Report said. But Afghanistan has more than made up for the shortfall because of a production increase and a higher yield per acre than in Southeast Asia. Afghanistan was responsible for three-quarters of the world's illegal opium supply and for a 5 percent...

<p>The failure of international forces to curb Afghanistan's soaring poppy production threatens to destabilize the entire Central Asian region and bankroll a new generation of terrorists, Kazakhstan's foreign minister said yesterday.</p> <p>Foreign Minister Kasymzhomart Tokayev said his country is a natural transit route for heroin and other illegal drugs from Afghanistan to Russia and markets in Europe. If surging production in Afghanistan is not curtailed, he warned, his country could face exploding drug use and other social problems.</p>

IT was just after 11pm when heavily armed Taliban guerillas crept into a tiny village in the Panjwai district of southern Afghanistan. One group trained their weapons on the governor's residence while four others moved towards the local compound of the Afghan charity Co-ordination of Humanitarian Assistance. In the front garden, they found CHA worker Syed Abdul Jamil. "You are NGO workers," one of the gunmen said as he shot dead the 35-year-old father of one. Jamil's colleague rushed to the doorway shouting: "Why are you doing this?" The answer came in another fatal spray of bullets. The killers then...

<p>Officials have discovered 40,000 opium poppies in the Sierra National Forest, 35 miles northeast of Fresno, raising concerns that drug cartels may be looking at California's lush public lands to set up illicit farms.</p> <p>U.S. Forest Service officials said this is the first time they have ever found this large a crop of the narcotic-producing plants in California. The plants are not typically grown in the United States, say federal drug agents. Opium poppies, which thrive in dry climates, are more commonly grown in Asia, Mexico and most recently in Colombia.</p>

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AP) - Mohammed Din said he had two choices to survive Afghanistan's crushing poverty: beg or grow poppies. Despite a countrywide ban by Afghan President Hamid Karzai, he chose poppies - the crop used to make heroin. The United Nations says Din is not alone. Afghanistan is expected to have a bumper harvest this season and produce about 4,000 tons of opium, making it the world's No. 1 producer again, a record it had held prior to the eradication of poppies by the Taliban rulers in 2001. A preliminary survey of 134 districts of Afghanistan, carried out last...

Soft rolling hills, their sides ablaze in the vibrant colors of Antelope Valley's wildflowers, are a very inviting sight to all - even sheep. While many people converge upon fields of California golden poppies with cameras to hopefully catch a wonderful memory, sheep are hoping to catch a meal. In fields of wildflowers located near the Antelope Valley California Poppy State Reserve, located 15 miles east of Lancaster, herds of sheep graze on poppies and other wildflowers, a spring ritual that is believed to enhance future poppy blooms. The sheep are not grazing on poppies in the reserve. They munch...

By all accounts, this year's crop of poppies, the state flower, has been one of the most bountiful in recent memory, although they were a bit shy with the weekend's blustery and cloudy weather. On Sunday, to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the naming of the poppy as the state flower, about 100 members of the community took the long and winding drive out to the Antelope Valley Poppy Reserve to mark the occasion. "We couldn't have asked for a better poppy season," keynote speaker Assemblywoman Sharon Runner said, adding she is happy to be involved with the park "so...

Cannabis poses a greater threat to health than tobacco, lung experts have warned. The warning comes on the day that Home Secretary David Blunkett is due to make a Commons statement about the future of government drug policy. Many young people are simply not aware that smoking cannabis may put them at increased risk of respiratory cancers and infections . Dame Helena Shovelton: The Home Affairs Select Committee has recommended that cannabis is downgraded from a class B drug to class C. This would mean that possession would lead to a caution, rather than arrest. The British Lung Foundation is...