Drug money continues to fund Taliban operations: Maria Sultan

US contributing to Taliban cause by failing to stifle money streams funding terrorists.

Defence analyst Maria Sultan claimed on last night’s Express 24/7 show Witness with Quatrina Hosain that the US was contributing to the Taliban in part by allowing the poppy trade to flourish.

Quatrina Hosain hosted former ambassador Asif Ezdi, Editor of Blue Chip magazine Humayun Gohar and Director of South Asian Strategic Stability Institute Maria Sultan in the program to talk about the Pakistan-America relationship and the recent Wikileaks cables.

The cables released over the weekend reveal that the US had the ISI listed as a terrorist organisation.

Sultan questioned the US approach towards controlling the booming poppy cultivation in Afghanistan which was undoubtedly one source for the Taliban to fund its continued operations on both sides of the Durand line.  Furthermore there was a ready supply of weapons and other supplies available from raiding NATO supply lines.

Another source of funding, Sultan revealed, was how payment to Afghan contractors was landing into Taliban hands. Local contractors hired by Afghan government and security forces were in fact local warlords who also paid their dues to the Taliban, hence the U.S. money was ultimately part-funding the enemy, she said.

Ezdi believed that stopping the money trail would include freezing foreign donations. He said that guerrilla organisations like Talibans did not require massive funding to conduct its operations. However its network ensured that there was a steady stream of money coming in from other countries.

Gohar quoted a book “Mr. Nice” which talked about how the Americans were involved in establishing a trade conduit for Afghan drugs from the fields in Kandahar, all the way to buyers in Europe via Continental lines. The US had already half financed the war during the Soviet invasion in this manner, he said, implying a similar strategy was at work currently.

Sultan further commented on the strained ties between Pakistan and America in light of the recent Wikileaks expose that this may in fact be a ploy where by US can leave the region, leaving behind its private contractors to continue the fight. The only way ISI could be made to accept this change in nature  of the war, was to demonise the ISI, and recent visit of Gen. David Petraeus was to flame anti-ISI sentiments.

The guests, who rejected the Wikileaks cables as "staged" believed that the ISI was being singled out by US as a primary scapegoat to its lack of success in the war.