MOSCOW, March 12 (RIA Novosti) - The head of Russia’s drug enforcement agency has lamented that Afghan heroin deliveries to Russia are still high.
“I cannot say that Afghan heroin deliveries to Russia have reduced over the past 10 years because heroin production is not being terminated but on the contrary is unfolding,” Viktor Ivanov, who leads Russia’s Federal Drug Control Service, said in an interview with RIA Novosti published Monday.
Ivanov said his agency has been discovering “more and more laboratories that produce and send drugs in the direction of Russia.” He explained that most labs are located in Afghanistan’s north.
The Russian drug enforcement chief said 4,000-8,000 metric tons of opium is produced in Afghanistan annually, adding that the tremendous amount is too hard to sell in that country, which is why is “is supplied to remote markets, one of which is Russia.”
“The second largest market is the EU,” Ivanov said. “It is evident that the problem can only be solved when Afghanistan stops producing drugs in such tremendous amounts.”
He said the total drug production in Afghanistan is worth over $100 billion, which, he said, is just a "modest" estimate.
