NARCOTICS ABUSE IN BANGLADESH ON THE RISE

UNCLAS DHAKA 000102

SIPDIS

SENSITIVE

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: SNAR PGOV BG
SUBJECT: NARCOTICS ABUSE IN BANGLADESH ON THE RISE



1. (U) Summary: The number of Bangladeshi drug addicts is
rising. While the media often focus on small-time dealers
and destitute addicts, staff and a recovering addict at one
NGO claim abuse is growing fastest among the relatively
affluent, including college females. End Summary.


2. (U) There is no consensus number of drug addicts in
Bangladesh, but some estimates go as high as 2.5 million.
Local media regularly report on narcotics markets, primarily
heroin, opium, and phensidyl, and their customers living on
the fringes of urban society. More uncommon is reporting on
relatively affluent abusers, though one article quoted a
university proctor as saying drugs on campus is "an open
secret."

SIPDIS


3. (SBU) Econoff recently met with Brother Ronald Drahozal,
his deputy director, and a recovering addict of APON,
Bangladesh's only 12-step substance abuse recovery program.
They agreed that illicit drug usage in Bangladesh is
escalating, but said that it cuts across socio-economic
lines. The recovering addict, who spoke good English and
appeared educated, stated that by the time he was 13, he and
50 percent of his classmates had experimented with cannabis
and alcohol. By the time they were in high school, they had
all moved on to injectable opiates, he said.


4. (SBU) Female university students, econoff was told, are
increasingly performing opportunistic sex work to finance
their drug habits and live fashionably. Asked why females
from good backgrounds would begin abusing drugs in the first
place, the NGO staff and the recovering addict suggested the
women had been negatively influenced by female flat mates or
male students.


5. (SBU) Comment: APON, a well regarded NGO and a former INL
beneficiary, has an interest in communicating the worsening
drug problem in Bangladesh. Yet, no one disputes that abuse
here is a growing problem, that drug education in schools is
inadequate, and that at least some of the widespread criminal
violence in Bangladesh -- including arms trafficking in the
Chittagong Hill Tracts -- is narcotics related.
Acknowledgment of the problem is a notable step in a
conservative, Islamic society. Bangladesh's imams proved to
be valuable partners in our anti-human trafficking programs,
and if properly approached they might be equally useful in
anti-substance abuse initiatives.
THOMAS