AFGHANISTAN - Apr 1 - Militants Linked To Drugs Trade.

The commander of US-led coalition forces in Afghanistan, Gen. David Barno, tells reporters in Berlin there are growing signs of links between Muslim terrorist groups and the drugs trade in Afghanistan. He says the number of incidents where counter-terrorist operations uncovered illegal drugs increased in recent months. (His comments signal a growing readiness among senior US military officials to link terrorist groups to a booming opium industry. Apparently, Afghanistan remains the world's leading source of poppies used to make opium and heroin. Much of the heroin sold in Western countries originates in Afghanistan. Poppy production has increased since the fall of the Taliban in late 2001. US officials are reported by the FT as expressing fear that Afghanistan may produce its largest poppy harvest this year. The Kabul government and the UN have expressed growing alarm over the past year about the nexus between Islamic militant groups' financing and opium profits, but until recently US military officials said they had little solid evidence. Western officials familiar with US military policy said the Pentagon was unwilling to be drawn into the war on drugs or confront provincial militiamen on whom the coalition relies for operational support). Gen Barno says it is too early to identify a trend but acknowledges that "we are encountering more occasions where, during the conduct of counter-terrorist operations, we uncover drugs or some relationship to drug activities". A counter-terrorism raid "two or three weeks ago" in Uruzgan province (a Taliban stronghold in southern Afghanistan) led to a firefight and the discovery of poppy paste that, had it been converted to heroin, would have had a street value of $15m.