This is a Side Effect of Purdue Pharmas Great Painkillers

Good footage from AlJazeera from Kabul about Afghani smugglers.
If you don’t understand the connection to an American pharmaceutical company, it is briefly like so:

– OxyContin is a narcotic painkiller that is incredibly addictive

– Street value of an OxyContin pill is over $50

– Users of OxyContin (or other opioids) who become addicted experience incredibly painful emotional and physical withdrawals without the drug

– Street value of a hit of heroin is $5-$10 and produces the same effect as OxyContin

I am sure you can piece together the rest of the puzzle as to why Purdue Pharmas billion dollar drug that is basically “legal heroin” has fueled a global trade that also funds Al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations.…

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The “New Silk Road” of Heroin Smuggling

Kazakhstan is a country known mainly to Americans as the home of Borat, the farcical character perpetrated on the world by comedian Sasha Baron Cohen. However, Kazakhstan also sits on the “New Silk Road” of heroin smuggling that connects Asia and Europe.

Afghanistan supplies and estimated 90% of Europe’s heroin (and 75% of the world’s heroin).  Global political and economical factors have created a “perfect storm” of supply and demand for heroin between the manufacturers in the east and the consumers in the west (read about the Global Heroin Manufacturing Empire).

The New Silk Road of heroin smuggling is through the poor republics of the former Soviet Union.  The poverty in this region makes it rife with willing participants and the under trained and poortly equipped police forces can’t compete with the multi billion dollar industry.

The city of Almaty …

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