KABUL (Ariana News): A Spanish newspaper has reported that the drastic drop in poppy cultivation in Afghanistan has opened a gap for fentanyl in Europe.
A report from the European Drug Monitoring Center warns of the risk that a possible lack of global supply will be replaced with “more harmful synthetic opiates, such as fentanyl derivatives or nitazenes,” El Pais reported.
“We have no indication that there are synthetic opiates in Spain, but we are all watching with bated breath,” said the government delegate for the National Plan on Drugs, Joan Villalbí.
“The Taliban (IEA) announced that they would ban opium cultivation. We didn’t know if it would be for real or just for show. Now we have the first warnings that it could be happening,” sayid Villalbí. The document also points out another risk that comes from the lack of drugs: an increase in “polysubstances” among heroin users.
“It is a window of opportunity,” admits Barcelona’s chief investigative commissioner Ramon Chacón.
“They call it the chaos theory: if poppies are not grown in Kabul, thousands of people will die in Europe,” he said, about the consequences that a hypothetical heroin shortage would have on European markets, with consumers who would move on to more dangerous alternatives. But he insisted that the data so far refute that this scenario is immediately looming over Europe.
Opium poppy production in Afghanistan, previously the world’s top supplier, plummeted by 95 percent since the IEA banned the cultivation of narcotics in 2022, a United Nations report said last year.
IEA has said that it seriously fighting against cultivation and trafficking in Afghanistan.
It has assured countries not to have concerns over the smuggling of drugs from Afghanistan, but help farmers with alternatives.
Thousands will die if poppies not grown
