ianstone
06-20-2010, 09:29 AM
Taliban cash in on illegal trade
Estimates say the Pakistani economy is losing $16 billion a year through smuggling and much of the profit is being diverted to terrorism
Nicola Smith
Published: 20 June 2010
http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/multimedia/archive/00036/taliban-580_36272a.jpgTaliban fighters are extorting bribes from smugglers along the Pakistan border (Reuters) High in Pakistan’s lawless frontier region, the Taliban are extorting huge bribes from smugglers of alcohol and fertiliser destined for Afghanistan.
For the Frontier Corps, set up in 1907 by the British to patrol the Afghan border, the fight against smuggling is another skirmish in a battle against local tribesmen waged for more than a century. Now the 60,000-strong force is suffering heavy casualties from a newly confident foe.
Nearly 30 troops were listed as missing in action last week after a cross-border raid by 200 militants. Senior commanders admitted that the force was struggling to seal the porous 745-mile border.
The chamber of commerce in Peshawar, the frontier town on the edge of the Khyber tribal agency, estimates that the Pakistani economy is losing $16 billion a year through smuggling and that much of the profit is being diverted to terrorism.
“The federally administered tribal area is under Taliban control, and they charge the smugglers,” said Nauman Wazir, a Peshawar-based industrialist. “If you want to control terrorism, then this has to stop. It’s one of their main sources of income.
“Cameras, TVs, alcohol, music, which are all banned by the Taliban, are coming across and the Taliban are taking their share.”
The Frontier Corps has suffered hundreds of casualties in two years of fighting in the tribal areas. At night, at its Khyber base in the garrison town of Landikotal, the thud of artillery can be heard as troops in mountain outposts fire rounds at the Taliban in nearby Orakzai.
Much of the smuggling is based on loopholes in a trade agreement signed between Pakistan and Afghanistan 45 years ago which allows imported goods to pass duty-free for export to Afghanistan from the port of Karachi.
Several hundred lorries negotiate the tortuous roads to cross the Afghan border every day, many carrying duty-free goods. According to Major General Tariq Khan, of the Frontier Corps, many stop just over the border to unload and bring their wares straight back into Pakistan illegally through remote border crossings.
Pakistani transport companies have recently admitted to trafficking large quantities of ammonium nitrate fertiliser, an ingredient in Taliban bomb-making.
Even as 5,000 lorries a month carry Nato supplies for the mission in Afghanistan through the Khyber pass, fertiliser for roadside bombs is shipped along parallel tracks.
These are vast amounts how do they move such massive quantities ?
Estimates say the Pakistani economy is losing $16 billion a year through smuggling and much of the profit is being diverted to terrorism
Nicola Smith
Published: 20 June 2010
http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/multimedia/archive/00036/taliban-580_36272a.jpgTaliban fighters are extorting bribes from smugglers along the Pakistan border (Reuters) High in Pakistan’s lawless frontier region, the Taliban are extorting huge bribes from smugglers of alcohol and fertiliser destined for Afghanistan.
For the Frontier Corps, set up in 1907 by the British to patrol the Afghan border, the fight against smuggling is another skirmish in a battle against local tribesmen waged for more than a century. Now the 60,000-strong force is suffering heavy casualties from a newly confident foe.
Nearly 30 troops were listed as missing in action last week after a cross-border raid by 200 militants. Senior commanders admitted that the force was struggling to seal the porous 745-mile border.
The chamber of commerce in Peshawar, the frontier town on the edge of the Khyber tribal agency, estimates that the Pakistani economy is losing $16 billion a year through smuggling and that much of the profit is being diverted to terrorism.
“The federally administered tribal area is under Taliban control, and they charge the smugglers,” said Nauman Wazir, a Peshawar-based industrialist. “If you want to control terrorism, then this has to stop. It’s one of their main sources of income.
“Cameras, TVs, alcohol, music, which are all banned by the Taliban, are coming across and the Taliban are taking their share.”
The Frontier Corps has suffered hundreds of casualties in two years of fighting in the tribal areas. At night, at its Khyber base in the garrison town of Landikotal, the thud of artillery can be heard as troops in mountain outposts fire rounds at the Taliban in nearby Orakzai.
Much of the smuggling is based on loopholes in a trade agreement signed between Pakistan and Afghanistan 45 years ago which allows imported goods to pass duty-free for export to Afghanistan from the port of Karachi.
Several hundred lorries negotiate the tortuous roads to cross the Afghan border every day, many carrying duty-free goods. According to Major General Tariq Khan, of the Frontier Corps, many stop just over the border to unload and bring their wares straight back into Pakistan illegally through remote border crossings.
Pakistani transport companies have recently admitted to trafficking large quantities of ammonium nitrate fertiliser, an ingredient in Taliban bomb-making.
Even as 5,000 lorries a month carry Nato supplies for the mission in Afghanistan through the Khyber pass, fertiliser for roadside bombs is shipped along parallel tracks.
These are vast amounts how do they move such massive quantities ?