Wednesday, November 4, 2009

Real trouble in Afghanistan

"Afghanistan's president says he wants people from "all parts of the country" in his government. President Hamid Karzai told reporters Tuesday that he will welcome anyone from the opposition into his government and will institute reforms to stamp out corruption."

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/11/03/world/main5504732.shtml

Karzai's the guy who won reelection by stealing the first round of the presidential vote and then forcing his opponent out of the runoff. His pledge to "stamp out corruption" would be more credible if his brother wasn't a leading Afghan opium dealer in bed with the Taliban and corrupt local police.

You didn't know that?

"British troops have seized several tons of raw opium on a farm belonging to the half brother of Afghan President Hamid Karzai . . . The opium was detected last month during an anti-drug-trafficking operation in the southern province of Kandahar . . . British troops arrested a group of Taliban and an Afghan police officer who had cooperated with them. Those arrests led investigators to a farm owned by Ahmed Wali Karzai, head of the provincial council of Kandahar and half brother of President Hamid Karzai. In a walled compound on the farm, troops found several tons of raw opium . . ."

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/Special/2009/08/13/Karzais-half-brother-an-opium-baron/UPI-88241250175600/

Which is worse? The tons of opium (headed to the streets of America's cities as heroin) or the fact that he's working with the Taliban?

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