Most Afghan narcotics are stopped in Russia, no transit to Europe.

2/6 Tass 155

MOSCOW, June 2 (Itar-Tass) -- Russia stops the most part of narcotics
smuggled into Russia, and there is practically no transit of banned
substances to Europe, Deputy Director of the Federal Drug Control Service
/FKSN/ and Head of the State Anti-Drugs Committee's staff Nikolai Tsvetkov
said in an interview to the Izvestia daily on Wednesday.
While commenting on Afghanistan's drug situation, he said that "it
looks much worse and tragic for our county."
"From the autumn of 2001, when the Enduring Freedom Operation began
and the UN security support international contingent entered Afghanistan,
the production of narcotics, which are mostly those of the opiate group,
has grown up by over 40 times," Tsvetkov said.
The most part of the drugs is trafficked via the northern route
traversing Russia.
"Presently, we do not have a common border with Afghanistan, there is
only the former Soviet-Afghan border, which is controlled by Turkmenistan,
Uzbekistan and Tajikistan," he said. "Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan have 7.500
kilometres of common border and they are involved in the trafficking."
"The law enforcement authorities of our neighbours fulfil the tasks
they have, but the reality is: the flow of narcotics from Afghanistan is
the size of an avalanche," Tsvetkov said. "This is why we are interested
in closer cooperation with our counterparts in Central Asia, Iran and,
surely, Afghanistan itself."
About 25-30 percent of the Afghan drug output are trafficked via the
northern route, he said.
"I would like to stress that it is not a transit flow to Europe via
Russia. This is the route into Russia itself," he said.
"I would argue with those who say that the Russian territory is used
for the trafficking of narcotics to Europe," he explained. "We stop, or
rather do not let, this poison from crossing our territory, and our
European counterparts are watchful quite reasonably, and they use good
equipment, too."
"There is practically no transit of narcotics via Russia to Europe,
and nobody claims we are responsible for any," he said.
"Of course, Europeans are very concerned about the flow of narcotics
from Afghanistan, but they have more grounds for that - the Balkan route
which crosses Iran, Turkey and Kosovo," he added.
-0-kar/usn