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InvisibleveggieM

Registered: 07/25/04
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Afghanistan is the fastest-growing maker of methamphetamine
    #28465416 - 09/11/23 01:23 PM (8 months, 2 days ago)

Afghanistan is the fastest-growing maker of methamphetamine, UN drug agency says
September 10, 2023 - Associated Press

ISLAMABAD (AP) — Afghanistan is the world’s fastest-growing maker of methamphetamine, a report from the United Nations drug agency said Sunday. The country is also a major opium producer and heroin source, even though the Taliban declared a war on narcotics after they returned to power in August 2021.

The United Nations’ Office on Drugs and Crimes, which published the report, said meth in Afghanistan is mostly made from legally available substances or extracted from the ephedra plant, which grows in the wild.

The report called Afghanistan’s meth manufacturing a growing threat to national and regional health and security because it could disrupt the synthetic drug market and fuel addiction. It said seizures of meth suspected to have come from Afghanistan have been reported from the European Union and east Africa.

Annual meth seizure totals from inside the country rose from less than 100 kilograms (220 pounds) in 2019 to nearly 2,700 kilograms (6,000 pounds) in 2021, suggesting increased production, the report said. But it couldn’t give a value for the country’s meth supply, the quantities being produced, nor its domestic usage, because it doesn’t have the data.

Angela Me, the chief of the UNODC’s Research and Trend Analysis Branch, told The Associated Press that making meth, especially in Afghanistan, had several advantages over heroin or cocaine production.

“You don’t need to wait for something to grow,” said Me. “You don’t need land. You just need the cooks and the know-how. Meth labs are mobile, they’re hidden. Afghanistan also has the ephedra plant, which is not found in the biggest meth-producing countries: Myanmar and Mexico. It’s legal in Afghanistan and it grows everywhere. But you need a lot of it.”

Me said it was too early to assess what impact the Taliban’s drug crackdown has had on meth supplies.

A spokesperson for the Interior Ministry, Abdul Mateen Qani, told the AP that the Taliban-run government has prohibited the cultivation, production, sale and use of all intoxicants and narcotics in Afghanistan.

He said authorities have destroyed 644 factories and around 12,000 acres of land where prohibited narcotics were cultivated, processed or produced. There have been more than 5,000 raids in which 6,000 people have been arrested.

“We cannot claim 100% that it is finished because people can still do these activities in secret. It is not possible to bring it to zero in such a short time,” said Qani. “But we have a four-year strategic plan that narcotics in general and meth in particular will be finished.”

A U.N. report published in November said that opium cultivation since the Taliban takeover increased by 32% over the previous year, and that opium prices rose following authorities’ announcement of a cultivation ban in April 2022. Farmers’ income from opium sales tripled from $425 million in 2021 to $1.4 billion in 2022.

The 2022 report also said that the illicit drug market thrived as Afghanistan’s economy sharply contracted, making people open to illegal cultivation and trafficking for their survival.

Afghans are dealing with drought, severe economic hardship and the continued consequences of decades of war and natural disasters.

The downturn, along with the halt of international financing that propped up the economy of the former Western-backed government, is driving people into poverty, hunger, and addiction.

An Afghan health official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media, said around 20,000 people are in hospitals for drug addiction, mostly to crystal meth. Of these patients, 350 are women. He said children are also being treated, but did not give the number nor their ages.

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Invisiblejack_straw2208
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Re: Afghanistan is the fastest-growing maker of methamphetamine [Re: veggie] * 1
    #28465480 - 09/11/23 02:40 PM (8 months, 2 days ago)

Brilliant headline, bravo! I bet that captagon stuff is way more sustainable.


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If you can’t tell what you desperately need, it’s probably sleep.

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OfflineDave Bowman
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Re: Afghanistan is the fastest-growing maker of methamphetamine [Re: veggie]
    #28466521 - 09/12/23 01:49 PM (8 months, 1 day ago)

Where are they getting all the precursors?  China, like everyone else?

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Invisiblenooneman
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Registered: 04/24/09
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Re: Afghanistan is the fastest-growing maker of methamphetamine [Re: Dave Bowman] * 1
    #28467060 - 09/12/23 10:34 PM (8 months, 1 day ago)

Probably growing them.

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InvisiblePatrickKn
I'm a teapot

Registered: 07/10/11
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Re: Afghanistan is the fastest-growing maker of methamphetamine [Re: Dave Bowman]
    #28467096 - 09/12/23 11:51 PM (8 months, 1 day ago)

Probably, imagine it would be pretty easy to cultivate ephedra in Afghanistan


Edited by PatrickKn (09/13/23 12:04 AM)

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Invisiblejack_straw2208
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Re: Afghanistan is the fastest-growing maker of methamphetamine [Re: PatrickKn]
    #28467131 - 09/13/23 01:19 AM (8 months, 1 day ago)

I can't reveal my sources but hella ephedra lives all over Afghanistan


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InvisibleveggieM

Registered: 07/25/04
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Re: Afghanistan is the fastest-growing maker of methamphetamine [Re: jack_straw2208] * 2
    #28467264 - 09/13/23 07:38 AM (8 months, 1 day ago)

"I can't reveal my sources but hella ephedra lives all over Afghanistan"

Could it be the third sentence? :smirk:

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Offlineoursoulsinmotion
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Re: Afghanistan is the fastest-growing maker of methamphetamine [Re: veggie]
    #28467359 - 09/13/23 09:22 AM (8 months, 1 day ago)

I wonder what the Afghans think about fent?
Im surprised about the meth there


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Alikchi...., Alikchi...., Alikchi....

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InvisiblePsilocybinMan
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Re: Afghanistan is the fastest-growing maker of methamphetamine [Re: oursoulsinmotion]
    #28467420 - 09/13/23 10:14 AM (8 months, 1 day ago)

:methbaggie::methisgood:

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Invisiblejack_straw2208
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Re: Afghanistan is the fastest-growing maker of methamphetamine [Re: oursoulsinmotion] * 1
    #28467653 - 09/13/23 02:03 PM (8 months, 20 hours ago)

They probably find it cheaper and less effective than the local artisan crafted heroin, but anything that'll take the edge off the speed is likely seen as a boon


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InvisiblePatrickKn
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Re: Afghanistan is the fastest-growing maker of methamphetamine [Re: veggie]
    #28468046 - 09/13/23 07:46 PM (8 months, 14 hours ago)

Quote:

veggie said:
"I can't reveal my sources but hella ephedra lives all over Afghanistan"

Could it be the third sentence? :smirk:



I can't read more than two sentences in one sitting. :sup:

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Invisibledurian_2008
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Re: Afghanistan is the fastest-growing maker of methamphetamine [Re: oursoulsinmotion]
    #28468711 - 09/14/23 10:32 AM (7 months, 30 days ago)

Quote:

oursoulsinmotion said:
I wonder what the Afghans think about fent?
Im surprised about the meth there




Stimulants like catha, coffee, and Captagon are not necessarily considered "drugs", in the sense of dulling one's mind. There was a yerba mate fad.

But, nicotine addicts might have faced an unfortunate punishment on the machine used to process leaves. (The accused appeared to have been drugged.)

Taqiyyya, depending on whether it can be weaponized for culture jihad.

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InvisibleveggieM

Registered: 07/25/04
Posts: 17,538
Re: Afghanistan is the fastest-growing maker of methamphetamine [Re: durian_2008]
    #28470148 - 09/15/23 02:44 PM (7 months, 29 days ago)

Related article questioning the UNODC report ...

The wild, green shrub in Afghanistan that is dividing drug experts
September 15, 2023 - The Sydney Morning Herald

A wild, green shrub that has grown for centuries in the central mountains of Afghanistan is dividing international drug experts probing the embattled nation’s ballooning methamphetamine trade.

Researchers in the country and abroad were left scratching their heads this week after a United Nations  report raised alarm about the surging manufacture of crystal meth, linking its production to precursor chemicals or pharmaceuticals trafficked from legitimate markets.

The UN Office of Drugs and Crime report found highly addictive methamphetamine from Afghanistan is spreading across the globe, including Australia, South-East Asia and Europe, while the heroin trade slumps following a Taliban crackdown on poppy cultivation.

“The surge in methamphetamine trafficking in Afghanistan and the region suggests a significant shift in the illicit drug market and demands our immediate attention,” said UN Office of Drugs and Crime executive director Ghada Waly.

While the prevalence of the country’s meth trade is not in dispute, the report is at odds with research by international agencies and independent experts, which suggests the growth of the ice trade has not been fuelled by precursor chemicals, but by a perennial high-altitude plant: ephedra.

Experts who spoke to this masthead said suggesting otherwise was “inaccurate and misleading,” “strange” and not supported by local or open-source data.

Traditionally used by local villagers in medicine, the ephedra shrub grows at altitudes above 2500 metres. It can be harvested, dried and milled for conversion into ephedrine that is then used to produce methamphetamine.

Since 2017 global researchers, including the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction, have described a thriving cottage industry that low-skilled Afghan farmers have developed by harvesting the wild crop to bypass costly chemical processes that require specialised chemists.

For Dr David Mansfield, who has spent the better part of two decades researching Afghanistan and consulting on behalf of the British government, World Bank, and the Asian Development Bank, the UN’s latest report is tantamount to “bad science”.

“They offer no evidence of seizures of bulk pharmaceuticals, make ill-informed assumptions about relative conversion rates and costs, and completely ignore the large volumes of ephedra seized and destroyed by the Taliban,” Mansfield said.

He also rejected subsequent media coverage as “absolutely inaccurate and misleading” for suggesting meth trafficking in the country was rising as a result of the Taliban ban on opium.

Between 2013 and 2017, most methamphetamine from Afghanistan was produced by extracting precursors from pharmaceuticals, an expensive and complex method Mansfield describes as “the old Breaking Bad medicine approach”.

But from about 2018, he said satellite imagery — photos, videos — has consistently shown meth being produced in large volumes from ephedra.

“You don’t see over-the-counter medicines or bulk pharmaceuticals. You see dried ephedra and ephedra soaking in large tanks. This report seems to suggest UNODC are very late to the parade, and they’ve arrived wearing the wrong costume.”

Mansfield said he was compelled to call out the report after being contacted by multiple governments, institutions and independent colleagues who were sceptical of the report.

Seizures of methamphetamines in Afghanistan have soared in the five years to 2021, reflecting an almost twelvefold increase from 2.5 tonnes to 29.7 tonnes, the UNODC report said, describing a “rapid and sustained expansion”.

It examined the three key inputs for producing methamphetamine, comparing how much was needed to produce one kilogram of the drug: bulk industrial-grade ephedrine (1.75 kilograms), pharmaceutical cold medications (27.8 kilograms) and dried ephedra plant (196.8 kilograms).

Between 6500 and 11,700 tonnes of fresh plant matter would have been needed to reflect the regional seizures of 29.7 tonnes in 2021, versus 26 tonnes to 47 tonnes of industrial-grade material, UNODC estimated.

While the report acknowledged the use of ephedra and the fact it is cheaper to use in the short term, it said the large amount needed, and the labour involved, made it unlikely the trade could depend on the plant alone, highlighting its “remoteness, limited harvest period, and low plant density”.

Medications and industrial chemicals were more efficient and posed a far bigger threat, it said.

“The emphasis on ephedra risks undermining effective law-enforcement responses, which need to be regionally coordinated and focus on preventing and curbing the diversion and smuggling of bulk chemical precursors,” UNDOC said in a statement this week.

Mansfield rejected any assertion that harvesters could not capture the sort of tonnage needed for major drug production, pointing to satellite imagery from data firm ALCIS on November 27, 2021, which captured more than 9000 metric tonnes of ephedra in mounds at the Abdul Wadood bazaar, then Afghanistan’s largest open-air drug market.

Andrew Cunningham, who oversees markets, crime and supply reduction for the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction, said the agency was also surprised by the report which did not align with its understanding of the situation in Afghanistan.

“We can only comment about what we see and what we have evidence for. And the evidence that I’ve seen so far supports that ephedra is still the main source,” he said.

Cunningham added that the report seemed “a bit strange” and lacked information to back up the warnings about bulk pharmaceuticals, urging the importance of providing evidence.

“The whole purpose of our agencies is to present evidence to inform policy. And so, when presenting evidence to inform policy, you need to be very careful about what you present because big decisions can be made based on the analysis and the findings of your report,” he said.

“So the UNODC, we think, must have some information, which is not explicitly stated in this report.”

In March, this year the AFP formally labelled Afghan-produced meth as a “significant and emerging threat” to Australia, as part of a crackdown on outlaw motorcycle gangs.

Federal authorities began tracking a rapid increase in the number of illegal imports of Afghan-produced methamphetamine entering the country, especially through 2022.

Commander Investigations Eastern Command Kate Ferry said forensic examination of recent imports show manufacturing techniques in the region have improved significantly, meaning the purity of Afghan methamphetamine is now equal that of South-East Asia and Mexico.

“Afghan wholesale prices have more than doubled since 2020, likely driven by higher purities, yet remain significantly less than wholesale prices in South East Asia,” Commander Ferry said.

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Invisiblejack_straw2208
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Re: Afghanistan is the fastest-growing maker of methamphetamine [Re: veggie]
    #28470600 - 09/15/23 11:18 PM (7 months, 29 days ago)

Dude in that pic def has ye olde surgeon eyes!!


Local governments appear to be actively trying to cast doubt on the notion that anyone would start with the ephedra plant instead of pharmaceuticals to make meth. Satellite photos recorded what appeared to be around 9000 tonnes of ephedra plant material soaking in vats.

Article says Afghan meth is on par with Mexico and SE Asia in purity now too.


Quote:

Seizures of methamphetamines in Afghanistan have soared in the five years to 2021, reflecting an almost twelvefold increase from 2.5 tonnes to 29.7 tonnes, the UNODC report said.

It examined the three key inputs for producing methamphetamine, comparing how much was needed to produce one kilogram of the drug: bulk industrial-grade ephedrine (1.75 kilograms), pharmaceutical cold medications (27.8 kilograms) and dried ephedra plant (196.8 kilograms)







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If you can’t tell what you desperately need, it’s probably sleep.

Edited by jack_straw2208 (09/15/23 11:45 PM)

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Invisiblenooneman
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Registered: 04/24/09
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Loc: Utah
Re: Afghanistan is the fastest-growing maker of methamphetamine [Re: jack_straw2208] * 1
    #28471848 - 09/17/23 03:38 AM (7 months, 28 days ago)

There's no way it's anything other than ephedra. I knew right away when I saw the headline that they were using ephedra. It probably grows even better than opium in Afghanistan, and it's more useful. Ephedra just by itself is a stimulant. I'm surprised they haven't grown it more widely before now.

And fuck man, if I was living in Afghanistan, I sure as shit would be using stimulants. Probably benefits everyone with a job over there. The only jobs they got are shitty back breaking labor, the exact kinda thing you need stimulants for to make tolerable.

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Invisibledurian_2008
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Re: Afghanistan is the fastest-growing maker of methamphetamine [Re: nooneman]
    #28472322 - 09/17/23 11:13 AM (7 months, 27 days ago)

This is actually a labor issue, and afaic the West is built on it. In the dregs of that social Darwinian foodchain, at the foundation of that pyramid of castes of professionals, drugs are a staple of life as we know it.

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