Central Asia

Coming soon: Taliban hash?

Posted on August 16th, 2021 by Bill Weinberg and tagged , , , , , .

AfghanistanHaving funded their long insurgency with opium and hashish, the Taliban are poised to establish a “narco-state” in Afghanistan. The multi-billion dollar 20-year US effort to suppress cultivation of illicit crops in the county failed as dramatically as its war against the Taliban. Exports of Taliban-tainted smack and hash are already reaching Europe, and may reach US shores.

Pliny the Elder: ancient pioneer of medical marijuana

Posted on March 4th, 2020 by Bill Weinberg and tagged , , , , .

PlinyAn esteemed scholar and writer from ancient Rome recently re-emerged in the news with reports that a forensic study confirmed claims that his skull had been found. Historians of the cannabis plant have long contended that Pliny the Elder was among the first to make note of its curative and psychoactive properties.

Prohibition Partners analyze Asian cannabis market

leafA new report by the British think-tank Prohibition Partners foresees a $5.8 billion cannabis market in Asia by 2024—if the tentative seeds of liberalization now witnessed across the continent in fact bear fruit.

Cannabis legalization coming to Kyrgyzstan?

Posted on September 19th, 2017 by Bill Weinberg and tagged , , , , , .

KyrgyzstanThe post-Soviet republics of Central Asia have emerged as a key smuggling route for hashish making its way from Afghanistan to European markets—as well as developing their own local hashish (and opium) production. As ever, the illegal economy is breeding destructive gunplay throughout the region. But in these authoritarian nations, proosals for legalization have been marginalized—until now.

Growing gunplay in hashish gateway Tajikistan

Posted on July 20th, 2017 by Global Ganja Report and tagged , , , , , , , .

TajikistanAlthough rarely in the news, the Central Asian republic of Tajikistan is a critical corridor for hashish and opiates bound from southern neighbor Afghanistan to Europe and world markets. Violence associated with the cross-border trade is predictably endemic and appears to be escalating. Border guards have repeatedly clashed with traffickers on the frontier in recent weeks, leaving several dead.

Archaeologists unearth ancient cannabis 'burial shroud'

Posted on October 18th, 2016 by Global Ganja Report and tagged , , , .

Central Asia Archaeologists working in China's far western Xinjiang region report the discovery of an "extraordinary cache" of cannabis, found in an ancient burial site. National Geographic says the unprecedented find "adds considerably to our understanding of how ancient Eurasian cultures used the plant for ritual and medicinal purposes."  Writing in the journal Economic Botany, archaeologist Hongen Jiang and his colleagues describe the burial of a 35-year-old adult man with Caucasian features in Xinjiang's Turpan Basin. The body was laid out on a wooden bed with 13 cannabis plants—each nearly three feet long—placed across the chest.

Tajikistan eradicates opium —and cannabis?

Posted on March 20th, 2014 by Global Ganja Report and tagged , , , , , , .

TajikistanPolice in Tajikistan on March 13 burned more than 722.3 kilograms of seized drugs, the Interior Ministry said in a statement. The destroyed substances included 43 kilos of heroin and 11.2 kilos of opium. Although the statement did not make it clear, the remainder (and big majority) of the burned hauls was presumably cannabis. The Interior Ministry did say that troops of the Drug Control Agency (AKN)  seized 100 kilograms of hashish at a car stop in Khusheri village. This was the latest and largest of several hashish and herion seizures by the AKN in recent weeks. In one case, police are searching for a suspect who injured an AKN officer with a knife before making his getaway.

Afghanistan: tensions with Iran over opium smuggling routes

Posted on September 2nd, 2013 by Global Ganja Report and tagged , , , , , , .

AfghanistanThe Strategy Page reports that on Aug. 23 an anti-Iran demonstration was held in the provincial capital of western Afghanistan's Herat province. Local Afghans accused Iranian diplomats based at the local consulate of bribing officials, and operating as a "criminal gang." Somebody is certainly bribing Afghan police and border officials in the province bordering Iran; Iranian security forces have seized 214 tons of opium and heroin at the Afghan border in the last five months, and made hundreds of arrests. A western opium route linking Afghanistan to global markets through Iran appears to be opening, adding to the traditional southern route through the Khyber Pass to Pakistan and northern route through Central Asia to Russia.

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