Release of 2008 UNODC Report

We welcome the release of the 2008 United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) Report and are encouraged by its findings. The report further strengthens our commitment to the current comprehensive counternarcotics strategy in Afghanistan. We are especially encouraged to learn that 18 provinces, over half of Afghanistan’s 34 provinces, are now poppy free, a significant increase from 13 provinces in 2007. The gains in the North and East, which traditionally have been poppy-rich areas, clearly show that counternarcotics efforts can succeed, given adequate security conditions, integrating counter-narcotics efforts with the counter-insurgency campaign, and sustained political will.

We are pleased to note that total poppy cultivation in Afghanistan fell for the first time in 3 years, and is now at or below 2006 levels. In addition, the potential production of heroin from the Afghan poppy crop has also decreased. We are committed to building on these positive trends.

The drug threat in Afghanistan remains unacceptably high. We are particularly concerned by the deteriorating security conditions in the South, where the insurgency dominates, and where 98 percent of Afghanistan’s poppy is produced. The government of Afghanistan and the international community must redouble their efforts to build effective security so that the poppy crop in the South can be eliminated just as it has in the other parts of the country.

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