“If anyone violates the decree, the crop will be destroyed immediately and the violator will be dealt with in accordance with Sharia law,” the decree said, announced at a press conference by the Interior Ministry in Kabul. The decree stated that the production, use or transport of other drugs was also banned. Drug control was a major demand of the Islamist group’s international community, which invaded the country in August and seeks formal international recognition in order to lift sanctions that severely hamper banking, business and development. The Taliban banned poppy cultivation towards the end of their last government in 2000 as they sought international legitimacy, but met with popular outcry and later changed their stance, according to experts. Opium production in Afghanistan – which the United Nations estimated at $ 1.4 billion at its peak in 2017 – has risen in recent months, farmers and Taliban members told Reuters. The country’s dire economic situation has prompted residents of the southeastern provinces to cultivate illegal crops, which could yield faster and higher yields than legal crops such as wheat. Taliban sources told Reuters that they expected strong resistance from some elements within the group against the poppy ban and that there had been an increase in the number of poppy farmers in recent months. A farmer in Helmand, speaking on condition of anonymity, said poppy prices had more than doubled in recent weeks with rumors that the Taliban would ban its cultivation. But he added that he had to grow poppies to support his family. “The other crops are just not profitable,” he said.
