US EditionCIA ran covert program to sabotage Afghanistan’s opium crop: Washington Post
The CIA's decade-long covert program aimed to reduce heroin potency by spreading modified poppy seeds in Afghanistan, though lasting impact on opium cultivation was limited, officials said.
- Recently, The Washington Post revealed the Central Intelligence Agency ran a highly classified program that blanketed Afghan opium poppy fields with specially modified seeds, confirmed by 14 sources.
- The CIA sought to degrade opium potency by targeting heroin funding for corruption and the Taliban, obtaining a classified presidential `finding` from President George W. Bush to legalize the covert action.
- In the autumn of 2004, clandestine airdrops began using British C-130 aircraft on night flights, dispersing billions of specially developed seeds over Nangarhar province and Helmand province.
- The program was paused and then ended about 2015 because budget pressures strained the CIA Crime and Narcotics Centre, with mixed assessments as some officials said it worked for a time while SIGAR found no lasting reductions.
- The United States has spent about $US9 billion since 2001 on counternarcotics, and the Afghan crop rebounded last year by 19 percent, the United Nations said.
18 Articles
18 Articles
CIA launched operation to weaken Afghanistan opium production
A new report has revealed that America’s Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) was involved in a major decade-long operation that weakened Afghanistan’s opium production. The operation involved dispersing modified poppy seeds over the country’s vast fields, The Washington Post revealed this week. The plan, which aimed to degrade the potency of Afghanistan's billion-dollar opium crop, took place between 2004 and 2015. Opium is a key source of income …
Sydney Morning Herald
Inside the CIA’s secret mission to sabotage Afghanistan’s opium
Clandestine night flights dropped billions of genetically modified seeds over poppy fields in a classified mission to disrupt the country’s lucrative opium trade.
The CIA has been working for over a decade, an ultra-secret operation in Afghanistan, leaving modified mam seeds from the plane to reduce the opium power used for heroin production. Revealed now by Washington Post, the program saw the sabotaging...
For more than ten years, the US intelligence agency conducted a secret operation to sabotage Afghan heroin production by dispersing seed without morphine, says the Washington Post.
The CIA is said to have secretly dropped poppy seeds over Afghanistan. The mission's aim, according to a media research, was to weaken drug production in the country.
Coverage Details
Bias Distribution
- 50% of the sources lean Left
Factuality
To view factuality data please Upgrade to Premium
