addiction squalor and misery
under this bridge in the west of kabul
lives left broken by
drugs for years heroin use has been a
major problem here
but now many are turning to a new
cheaper fix
crystal meth
enjoy your community
[Music]
the vast majority of the world's heroin
made
using these poppies now it's emerging as
a major producer of crystal meth
another dangerously addictive illegal
drug
the boom has been fueled by the
discovery that this common afghan plant
can be used to make the key ingredient
ephedrine
poor afghans in rural communities can
produce it in makeshift labs like this
one
before selling it on to be refined into
meth
so this is a classic ephedrine lab it
has
using satellite images a team of
researchers has been tracking the growth
of the ephedrine labs
they found more than 300 in one district
alone
the realization that you could produce
methamphetamine
from a wild crop in the mountains this
ephedra crop
has been a fundamental game changer
you've gone from the use of
imported over-the-counter medicines at a
high cost
to being able to use a low price
commodity that is growing in its
abundance
and simple chemistry in the past the us
has carried out airstrikes on suspected
drugs labs
the taliban are believed to charge them
taxes
but the labs are so easy to rebuild the
campaign
soon stopped meth
with suspected links to afghanistan has
been discovered
as far away as australia here
a seizure with a street value of more
than 50 million dollars
dissolved in mineral water bottles
what we are seeing and what we are
monitoring is an increase in
methamphetamine coming from afghanistan
and the surrounding countries around
there
and the forensic analysis you've done on
the meth does it suggest that
it was produced using this ephedra plant
so all the pro-following results that we
have received from these seizures
uh indicates to us that uh the starting
product
is the etherjet plant obviously for that
that for us that yields
critical information meth from
afghanistan
may be exported around the world but
it's causing misery back here too
continuing instability means the amount
produced
and the number of lives ruined is likely
to rise
second comani bbc news
you