Federal Minister for Narcotics Control Nawabzada Muhammad Khan Hoti has said that Balochistan was declared poppy-free and there are few areas in Fata and some parts of NWFP where poppy is still cultivated.
"Present government is making all-out efforts to check the poppy cultivation and make Pakistan a poppy free country", the Minister said while talking to Canadian High Commissioner in Pakistan, Randolph B. Mank, who called on him here on Friday.
The Canadian envoy discussed the issues related to control of drug trafficking in Pakistan. He said that in spite of meager sources, Pakistan is trying its level best to make Pakistan a poppy-free country. However, he stressed the need to check poppy cultivation in Afghanistan where unprecedented growth is witnessed in the last seven years.
Afghanistan is currently producing over 90 per cent of world opium poppy, the minister said. He said that the international community should help Pakistan effectively manning the long, hostile and porous border with Afghanistan. He lauded the role of Anti Narcotics Force (ANF) in elimination of drug use, cultivation and trafficking saying that with its present strength of less than two thousand personnel, the ANF is very thinly spread across the big border and also within the country.
He thanked the High Commissioner for extending help to the ministry in areas as Border Control, Global Container Control programme and offering professional training to the officers of ANF. He assured the High Commissioner the present government would leave no stone unturned in getting rid of drug menace from the country as well as from the region. The High Commissioner thanked the Minister and assured him that the Government of Canada would continue providing all possible assistance to Pakistan in this regard.
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