A former senior counternarcotics official in the U.S. State Department is adding a strong voice to the growing chorus accusing Afghan officials of doing little to stem narcotics and related corruption in the war-torn nation, the New York Times reported July 24.

In an article published July 27 in The New York Times Magazine, Thomas Schweich wrote that failures of the Afghan government, in conjunction with inaction on the part of the United States and the international community, have resulted in Afghanistan becoming a virtual narco-state. Schweich is presently a visiting law professor at Washington University in St. Louis.

Schweich says that drug traffickers in Afghanistan routinely buy off judges, police chiefs and other officials at the highest level of government, and that President Hamid Karzai has shielded these officials from sanction. Schweich reiterates an often-heard allegation that the Afghan president's brother, Ahmed Wali Karzai, has been involved in the drug trade.

An Afghan counternarcotics minister in charge of drug eradication teams has advocated aerial spraying to kill poppy plants in rural areas, but the Afghan cabinet rejected the idea over health and environmental concerns. Still, both U.S. and Afghan officials acknowledge that opium production is down in some parts of the country, with up to 20 of 34 provinces expected to be free of poppies this year.

Schweich's article criticizes the Pentagon for largely wanting no part of the drug-fighting effort in the country. William B. Wood, the U.S. ambassador in Kabul, states that while the military is indeed focusing its attention on counterinsurgency efforts, there is a growing sense that the drug trade impedes progress in seeking to achieve security in the nation.