§ Dr. TongeTo ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what proportion of the opium poppy fields in Afghanistan have been destroyed; and what area this covers. [116416]
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Mr. Mike OBrienIn April 2002 President Karzai announced an eradication programme to tackle the 2002 opium poppy crop. The Afghan authorities tell us that they succeeded in destroying 17,300 hectares of opium poppies. In light of the UN estimate that 74,000 hectares were cultivated in 2002 this amounted to approximately 23 per cent. of the total crop.
The Afghan Government are also carrying out eradication operations to combat the 2003 opium poppy crop. It has not yet produced figures for how much of this years harvest it has managed to destroy. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime is conducting a survey into the 2003 Afghan opium poppy crop. The results should be published in the autumn.
§ Dr. TongeTo ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how much opium has been(a) impounded and (b) destroyed by the Afghan Transitional Administration in each month since January 2002. [116417]
Mr. Mike OBrienThe Afghan Interim and Transitional Administrations have not produced figures for the amount of illicit drugs seized since coming into office. Press reports of seizures throughout Afghanistan since the middle of 2002 have not been verified either by the central authorities or international organisations. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime compiles annual seizure statistics globally but has no reliable figures for Afghanistan.