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Burma's Druglords Watch Afghanistan Closely
The leaders of the Wa State, a remote area of North Eastern Burma in the heart of the notorious Golden Triangle, have been watching developments in Afghanistan very closely. "The reason – opium and it's derivative heroin – previously Afghanistan's main export," says Hideyuki Takano, author of "The Shore Beyond Good and Evil," a new book subtitled "A Report from Inside Burma's Opium Kingdom," taking us behind the "Poppy Curtain" into the remote Wa State.
Opium and heroin are the lifeblood of the Golden Triangle, now mostly centered in Northern Burma. Afghanistan under the Taliban severely curtailed opium production in 2001, leading the U.S. State Department this year to declare Burma (Myanmar) as the top producer internationally, however with the collapse of the Taliban, opium production there has surged.
As with Afghanistan, the Wa State's main hard currency earner is narcotics. "The Wa State would collapse if opium production ceased in the area," says Takano. To back his assertion he lets us tag along on a 7-month journey into the Wa State, a land of corruption and guerrilla warfare. We hear the voices of the poverty stricken poppy farmers and the attitudes of the Wa's top leadership.
With a strong army to back them, tacit approval from Burma's military rulers and international attention focused elsewhere, the Wa leaders are still continuing to quietly profit from the movement of large quantities of drugs with virtual impunity and this seems set to continue for years to come.
"The Shore Beyond Good and Evil: A Report from Inside Burma's Opium Kingdom" by Hideyuki Takano, Kotan Publishing, ISBN 0970171617, 277pp, $23.95.
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