Friday, May 25, 2012 -
Kyrgyzstan’s drug control agency on Wednesday said it set up a new narco-post on the southern border with Tajikistan.
The counter-narcotics office was built at the village of Arka district in Batken province, a high and mountainous border area that is frequently crossed by drugs smugglers traveling to markets further north.
The area borders the Sughd region of Tajikistan.
The post was built with financial and technical assistance from the U.S. Central Command, whose military forces are deployed in Afghanistan, source of around 90 percent of the world’s heroin used in making opium.
Afghan heroin smugglers take northern routes through the poorly protected Central Asian states to Russia and Europe where the drugs are sold.
“The building is equipped with a fully-equipped office that has all the necessary conditions for the performance of duty,” the Tajik State Service for Drug Control (GSKN) said in a statement, the KyrTAG news agency reported.
GSKN chairman Orozalliev Vitaliy and the governor of Batken province attended the opening ceremony along with Kyrgyz law enforcement and security agency officials.
Washington was represented by the U.S. Ambassador to Kyrgyzstan Pamela Spratlen as well as officials of U.S. Central Command.
“The fight against drug trafficking is a common concern for all states,” Spratlen told participants at the opening ceremony.
She also said Washington will support the building for four additional narco-posts.