PRT/KUNDUZ: STRONG INDICATIONS THAT

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 05 KABUL 002601

SIPDIS

SENSITIVE
SIPDIS

STATE FOR SA/FO, SA/A, S/CR, SA/PAB, S/CT,
EUR/RPM
STATE PASS TO USAID FOR AID/ANE, AID/DCHA/DG
NSC FOR AHARRIMAN
CENTCOM FOR CG CFC-A, CG CJTF-76, POLAD
REL NATO/AUST/NZ/ISAF

E.O. 12958 N/A
TAGS: PREL PGOV PTER SNAR AF

SUBJECT: PRT/KUNDUZ: STRONG INDICATIONS THAT
LOCAL DRUG LORDS BEHIND ATTACK IN BADAKHSHAN



1. (SBU) SUMMARY. There are strong indications
that the May 30 attack on a USAID alternative
livelihoods contractor in the remote river valley
district of Darayeen in Badakhshan province was
perpetrated by local drug lords who feared that
the contractor was undermining their multimillion
dollar poppy cultivation enterprise. However,
provincial law enforcement and intelligence
officials -- many of whom themselves are
suspected of being involved in drug trafficking
and production -- are quick to deny any direct
link between the attack and local drug lords.
They still insist the crime was carried out by
Taliban elements supported by Pakistan or by
someone else from outside province, or was the
accidental result of factional fighting within
the district. The political power of these local
drug lords probably explains why Darayeen has
never been targeted for eradication by the
governor. If Kabul decides to deploy the Afghan
Eradication Force (AEF) to Darayeen, the AEF
needs to go in with extra force and be prepared
for violent resistance. Any such deployment
should be closely coordinated with PRT Faizabad
and provincial authorities. In the longer term,
one way to break the hold that these drug lords
have on isolated, remote river valleys in Argoo,
Darayeen, and Teshkan is to open them up to
greater access by building a major, paved road
through their district centers. A good
opportunity to do that will be in the upcoming
Kishim-Faizabad road project. END SUMMARY.

ATTACK ON PADCO
--------------


2. (SBU) On May 30, a vehicle from PADCO, a
USAID contractor responsible for carrying out
alternative livelihood programs in Badakhshan and
Takhar provinces, was attacked with a powerful
improvised explosive device (IED) that instantly
killed an Afghan employee riding in the front
right passenger seat and mortally injured the
Afghan driver. Miraculously, the two Americans
riding in the back seat of the vehicle, one of
whom was the deputy chief of party for PADCO,
escaped with only minor injuries. It is clear,
however, that had the bomb, which appears to have
been remotely detonated, exploded just a foot
further to the rear of the unarmored Toyota Land
Cruiser, the Americans would have been seriously
injured, if not killed. While there have been a
number of attacks against PRT Faizabad and other
military forces in Badakhshan over the past
couple of years, civilians have been directly
targeted very rarely.

DARAYEEN: INDUSTRIAL-SCALE POPPY CULTIVATION
--------------


3. (SBU) The attack on PADCO occurred in Darayeen
district, a remote, high-altitude river valley in
the mountains about three hours southwest of the
provincial capital of Feyzabad, which can only be
reached by transversing a narrow, steep dirt road.

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PRToff had an opportunity to visit Darayeen,
including the site of the explosion, the day
after the attack, as part of previously scheduled
German CIMIC patrol to the district. There he
found a PADCO vehicle destroyed almost beyond
recognition and a valley almost completely
devoted to the growing of poppy. One sees many
poppy fields in other parts of Takhar and
Badakhshan, but not like in the Darayeen
Valley. Almost all the cultivated land in
Darayeen valley is used for growing
poppy. Practically no other crops are grown. In
most other poppy-producing areas in the northeast,
poppy accounts for 20-25 percent of the crop
grown (a poppy patch next to a much larger wheat
field, for example),but in Darayeen, the
percentage is much higher. IOM, who has been
overseeing a DFID-funded road project in Darayeen
over the past several months, reports that the
contractor has had trouble finding local labor
lately because everyone in the district is so
preoccupied with growing poppy.


4. (SBU) The planting of poppy appears to have
been deliberately staggered so that the harvest
will be spread over an extended period of
time. Some of the poppy was already
being harvested, some was flowering, some was in
the hook stage and some was still in the youthful
"cabbage" state. Ironically, a lot of the poppy
is being irrigated by canals that were dug out
and repaired through PADCO-funded cash-for-work
programs. Fields that are further from the river,
and cannot be irrigated by canals, were
being irrigated through expensive water pumps and
pipes that normal farmers cannot
afford. According to PRT Faizabad, the so-called
Upper Bazaar of the district center, also known
as Shahr-e Safa, hosts an opium production
facility and bazaar -- all just a few hundred
meters from the site of the attack on PADCO. IOM
reports that the contractor for the road project
in Darayeen has endured a number of security
problems, including being shot at and catching
someone trying to place an IED next to bridge it
was building. The district manager admitted to
the contractor that he was under pressure from
local poppy-growers to stop the road project
because it was making the district too accessible
to outsiders.

SEEMINGLY UNDENIABLE CONNECTION
--------------


5. (SBU) In short, one gets the impression
that local drug lords have taken complete control
of the Darayeen Valley and set up a centrally
controlled industrial poppy cultivation
system. This view is shared by PRT Faizabad, the
local UNAMA office and a number of NGOs and IOs
based in Faizabad that have extensive experience
in the area. They report that the situation in
other isolated river valleys in the neighboring
districts of Argoo and Teshkan is similar. Given
the environment in Darayeen, therefore, it is

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hard to escape the conclusion that the IED was a
deliberate attack by drug lords who saw PADCO and
its alternative livelihood programs as a threat
to their multimillion dollar business. PADCO had
an office in Darayeen, which brought a
steady stream of foreigners through what has
historically been a remote
and isolated district. The drug lords clearly
wanted PADCO and the foreigners
out. Unfortunately, it looks like they have
succeeded, at least in one respect. The PADCO
head of party has indicated to PRToff that he
plans to close the office in Darayeen. On the
other hand, the fact that PRT Faizabad went ahead
with its previously scheduled CIMIC patrol to the
district the day after the explosion sent a very
good message that the international community
will not be cowed by this attack. The PRT plans
to continue to carry out regular patrols and
other operations in the area.

AUTHORITIES BLAME OUTSIDERS, POLITICAL RIVALRIES
-------------- ---


6. (SBU) While most of the international
community in Faizabad believes that local drug
lords are the most likely perpetrators of the
attack against PADCO, provincial law enforcement
authorities -- many of whom are themselves
suspected of being involved in drug production
and trafficking -- are, not surprisingly,
unwilling to acknowledge this. PRToff called on
Badakhshan Chief of Police Shahjahan July 1 to
thank him for his quick response and assistance
on the day of the attack (he personally escorted
the two Americans back to Faizabad from Darayeen)
and to press him to pursue a vigorous
investigation to find those responsible. In
response to open-ended questions about who might
have carried out the attack, Shahjahan claimed
that police had found pieces of a metal pressure-
cooker at the scene, indicating that the bomb had
been work of well-known anti-government Taliban
members operating in Badakhshan with the support
of Pakistan. In this connection, he reeled off
four names: Abdul Allem Alawi, Qari Amir Allah,
Sallamudin and Qari Saifudin. Anticipating the
next question, Shahjahan said that the police
have not been able to arrest most of these people
for the same reason that Osama bin Laden remains
at large -- they have proved too difficult to
find. When PRToff noted that the chief of police
had not mentioned any possible connection to
poppy, Shahjahan gave a dismissive wave and said
that the Taliban, terrorism and drugs were all
interlinked.


7. (SBU) PRToff happened to be meeting with the
Badakhshan director of NDS, Abdul Samad Yastali,
when the news about the PADCO attack first
arrived. Yastali's theory was that the bomb had
really been aimed at the new district manager in
Darayeen, a former Hezb-e Islami commander, who
was at odds with Jamiat adherents in the district.
As with the chief of police, Yastali did not make

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any connection between the attack and the fact
that Darayeen is one of the biggest poppy-growing
areas in the province.


8. (SBU) During his May 31 visit to Darayeen
with the PRT CIMIC team, PRToff was greeted by
District Police Chief Zirat Shah, who had assumed
his position only two days earlier, after having
served previously as district police chief in the
southern district of Kuran Wa Munjan. Shah
reported that the local populace was very upset
at the attack on PADCO and had been very
appreciative of its work in the district.
Therefore, he was pretty certain that the attack
must have been perpetrated by somebody from
outside of Badakhshan. Like the others, he did
not think the attack was related to poppy, since
people associated PADCO with projects and not
with eradication. However, no one has come
forward with any information, even though the IED
was planted in an open area, visible from 360
degrees for more than a kilometer.

COMMENT
--------------


9. (SBU) It is unlikely that provincial law
enforcement authorities will, on their own,
pursue this case and catch those responsible for
the attack on PADCO. Not only do the police lack
the required technical skills and resources (in
Darayeen, the 47 police officers and soldiers
have no vehicles or radios, and only a handful of
weapons),they appear to have been corrupted from
top to bottom by drug money, as evidenced by
their refusal to even countenance the possibility
that local drug lords could be involved in the
attack. So far, unlike in the south of the
country, PRT Faizabad sees no clear link between
the Taliban and the opium economy in Badakhshan,
which appears to be solely controlled by local
drug lords.


10. (SBU) The power of these local drug lords
may also explain why Darayeen has never been
targeted for eradication by Governor Majid. The
governor's excuse has been that it is too hard to
get up to Darayeen and there is plenty of poppy
to eradicate in more accessible places like
Kishim, but that is probably not the whole story.
The fact is that the governor finds it easier to
eradicate plots of poppy that individual farmers
have grown on their own, than to take on the
big drug lords in places like Darayeen.
Unfortunately, on eradication, the governor seems
to be playing a double game. He appears to be
aiming to do just enough to make Kabul think he
is serious about eradication, but not enough to
upset the powers-that-be in the province. If
Kabul decides to deploy the Afghan Eradication
Force (AEF) to Darayeen, the AEF needs to go in
with extra force and be prepared for violent
resistance. Any such deployment should be
closely coordinated with PRT Feyzabad and
provincial authorities. The brutal attack on

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PADCO seems to demonstrate the lengths the drug
lords are willing to go to defend their empire in
Darayeen.


11. (SBU) In the longer term, one way to break
the hold that these drug lords have on isolated,
remote river valleys in Argoo, Darayeen, and
Teshkan is to open them up to greater access by
building a major, paved road through their
district centers. A good opportunity to do that
will be in the upcoming Kishim-Feyzabad road
project. Building the main road through Argoo,
Darayeen and Teshkan (rather than following the
current circuitous route along the Kowkcheh River)
would not only bring significant improvements to
these districts, but it would also cut more than
35 kilometers off what is now a 112-kilometer
trip.

NEUMANN