Indonesia drug woes fuel HIV, terrorism worries
Source: Reuters
By Ed Davies JAKARTA, Jan 23 (Reuters) - Indonesia faces a growing drugs problem that is fuelling concerns ranging from the spread of AIDS to links with militant groups and organised crime, the head of the country's anti-narcotics bureau said on Tuesday. The human cost is huge, with an estimated 572,000 intravenous drug users in the country in 2004 and approximately half found to be infected with the HIV virus, the most recent government data showed. There were also 15,000 drug-related deaths in that year. "We are currently faced with rising illicit drug production, trafficking and abuse," Made Mangku Pastika, the head of the National Narcotics Board, told foreign correspondents. Pastika is a 32-year veteran of the Indonesian police force and was the chief investigator in the deadly 2002 Bali nightclub bombings, blamed on Islamic militants. "I have deep concerns with the growing links between illicit drug trafficking and terrorist and transnational crime activities," he said. He pointed to the case of separatist rebels in Aceh and widespread allegations that they funded their fight by selling marijuana growing in the province on the tip of Sumatra province. The rebels reached a peace deal with the government in 2005 and authorities had destroyed 300 hectares (740 acres) of marijuana and were implementing a plan to help locals substitute the drug with other legal crops, he said. He estimated that there were still 500 hectares of marijuana growing in the province. As well as marijuana, the country of 220 million people faced problems from heroin and synthetic drugs like ecstasy and methamphetamine, known locally as "shabu", Pastika said. The country has also transformed from mainly just being a transit point for drugs to a source for them, he added. "With the increasing amounts and level of sophistication in domestic drug production, particularly in the area of amphetamine-type stimulants in recent years, our country has now become a source country for illicit drugs," he said. Illustrating this point, there have been some high profile busts of huge drug operations in recent years. Police found a laboratory in 2005 in Banten, west of Jakarta, capable of making one million ecstasy pills a week and various drugs with a potential street value of $600 million a year. Despite such successes, Pastika said Indonesia's size and porous borders, as well as the lucrative profits from selling drugs made fighting the problem a huge task. Costing just 5,000 rupiah (55 U.S. cents) a pill to make, ecstasy tablets sold for 100,000 rupiah each in the hundreds of nightclubs in the capital, Jakarta, and other big cities in Indonesia, he said.
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