The New York Times

Friday, July 17, 1998

OPIUM SURGE THEATENS U.N. AID TO AFGANS, OFFICIAL WARNS

By Barbara Crossette

United Nations, July 16, - An anti-narcotic program begun in Afghanistan late last year is in danger of being dismantled, a top United Nations official said, citing reports that opium poppy production may be increasing in areas under the control of the Islamic Taliban movement.

Pino Arlacchi, executive director of the United Nations Drug Control Program, also said in an interview that he was hearing for the first time of the opening of refineries to produce morphine, if not heroin, near the heart of the Taliban's religious center of Kandahar.

Both increased production and the refining of opium would violate the accord under which the United Nations would provide development aid in return for a gradual reduction of poppy cultivation.

At a news conference here today, Noorullah Zadran, the Taliban's representative-designate to the United Nations, said that the Taliban strongly opposed narcotics but that the drug-control program had demanded too much of the Taliban too soon.

Mr. Arlacchi, one of a shrinking group of United Nations officials who have been optimistic that agreements made with the Taliban would eventually work as planned, said he expects to get full reports in coming weeks on the planting of new opium crops.

"The pillar of the agreements is that they should destroy all the new poppy crops that we will detect or they will detect," Mr. Arlacchi said from his headquarters in Vienna.

"When we get the precise sites under cultivation, we will go back to them and ask them immediately to destroy this cultivation. If they will not do it, we will have to reconsider our agreement."

Mr. Arlacchi said he has told countries that contribute to aid for Afghanistan that if the Taliban, which controls about 85 percent of Afghanistan, do not comply, he was prepared to use the aid money to reinforce border patrolling around the country, through which Afghan opium passes.

"Until this moment, the actually delivered on the agreement," Mr. Arlacchi said. "On the first of June they destroyed two tons of opium." But new information has made him "rather pessimistic," he said.

Mr. Zadram of the Taliban said of the anti-drug program, "God knows we tried. There is a difference in cultures. There is a different perception." He added that money intended for the Afghans was being used up by United Nations administrative expenses before it reached the country.

Mr. Zadram complained that of a $16 million pledge to the Taliban in development aid, the Drug control Program had spent $11 million on administrative costs. "They gave us $$1.8 million for a project near Jalalabad area and they spent another #3.8 million in Helmand," he said.

The aid was to cover agricultural supplies and eventually some light manufacturing to supply jobs in areas where the opium crops is important to family earning. Even though the Taliban totally opposes the use of narcotics, it has been unable to provide economic alternatives to offer the people.

The Taliban was also "insulted" he said, by its exclusion from a United nations drug summit meeting in June at which the leader of the fragmented former government driven out of Kabul two years ago was allowed to speak because his rump administration still holds the United Nations seat - an anomaly that persists because the United States and other countries will not vacate the seat until the Taliban has met conditions to hold it.

At his news conference, Mr. Zadram also criticized private relief agencies in Kabul for refusing to move their residences, though not their offices, to a student hostel at the edge of the city. Responding to threats by the agencies to leave the country if they were forced to move, Mr. Zadram said he would question "the morality and wisdom" of such action, which would put the lives of children and others at risk.

He said relief groups, had been operating in a lawless Afghanistan without a functioning central government had become accustomed to doing whatever they wanted.

"They do not want to recognize any authorities," he said. "We are the government there. We have our laws. We have our regulations. If you want to come to our country, we would love to have them. But we have our own concerns."