Sat 09 October 2021:
Some drug addicts in Kabul say the Taliban do not leave them alone and do nothing but beat them.
“Ever since the Taliban came, they haven’t allowed us to go out,” said one drug addict. When he sees us, he beats us to death. You beat like an animal. Addicts get sick like animals. ”
Authorities say the goal is not to abuse addicts, but to send them back to hospitals.
“We arrest them and take them to hospitals,” said Maulvi Fazlullah, a Taliban official. Those who die will die and others will recover. “When they recover, they are free.”
The castor-type vehicle, full of addicts, goes to the hospital, where the addicts are being treated in two different phases.
Soon after the Taliban took power on Aug. 15, the Taliban Health Ministry issued an order to these facilities, underscoring their intention to strictly control the problem of addiction, doctors said.
Old or young, poor or once well-off, the Taliban view the addicts the same: A stain on the society they hope to create. Drug use is against their interpretation of Islamic doctrine. Addicts are also stigmatized by the wider, largely conservative Afghan community.
Taliban also implemented the only largely successful ban on opium production, between 2000-2001, before the U.S. invasion. Successive governments have failed to do the same.
Police roundups of addicts did occur during previous administrations. But the Taliban are more forceful and feared.
Health expert Mohammad Hanif Popal says: “We have two sections here, the first of which is the section where most patients are treated for pain. “They will be here for three days and if they are in a lot of pain, they will stay for three days and then the second phase will be referred to psychologists for psychiatric treatment.”
Families of addicts are also allowed to visit family members after some treatment.
Drug research in Afghanistan says there was a strict ban on heroin cultivation in the three and four years before the US-led invasion, but that control has dwindled over the past five years and will lead to tax-free smuggling. Type this weed cultivation and export.
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