Map of the week: The mystery of the missing opium

Source: BBC News

Mark Easton
8 Oct 08, 11:27 AM GMT

It's a mystery that has got British law enforcement officials and others across the planet scratching their heads. Put bluntly, enough heroin to supply the world's demand for years has simply disappeared.

-snip

For the past three years, production has been running at almost twice the level of global demand.The numbers just don't add up.

There are two credible theories.

Theory 1: A large and undocumented market has opened up in countries which don't want to admit the problem. Russia has long been in denial over the scale of its heroin problem and the same may be true in emerging drug markets like Iran, Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan.

-snip

Theory 2: Vast quantities of heroin and morphine are being stockpiled. Antonio Maria Costa, head of the UNODC is convinced that is the only explanation. In a recent bulletin he issues an urgent order: 'Find the missing opium.' "As a priority, intelligence services need to examine who holds this surplus, where it may go, and for what purpose" he says. "We know little about these stockpiles of drugs, besides that they are not in the hands of farmers."

Read more: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/markeaston/2008/10/map_of_the_week_the_mystery_of.html

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Western intellegence agencies for $1000 Alex.

:tinfoilhat:

NATO does not have the mission to destroy the poppy fields because it would "hurt the farmers". Apparently the farmers can't/won't grow anything else?

The farmers, in some number, are in cahoots with the Taliban-types to sell the opium made from the poppy fields to buy weapons.

The Taliban-types use the newly purchased weapons to wreak havoc in Afghanistan against the U.S., NATO and the Afghan population.

What is wrong with this picture?

Because no one knows what currency will prevail after the global financial crisis. In other words - they are sitting on it instead of converting it to cash.

worth of opium.

Lots of people I know are on painkillers of one kind or another.
I think these are being made from opium by the drug companies.
I have never known it to be so easy to get prescribed pain killers
and in good quantities.