Opium price 18 times higher since Taliban ban on poppy in Afghanistan

Before the ban was decreed by Taliban chief, Mullah Mohammad Omar, 1.25 kilograms of opium was being sold for 34.50 dollars. Today, the same amount is being sold for more than 600 dollars, the private news agency said.

Afghanistan, with 3,500 tons of opium production, was the largest supplier of illicit opium to the world last year. The United Nations Drug Control Programme (UNDCP) confirmed recently that the ban on poppy cultivation was being implemented and said it expected the supply of Afghan opium to world's underground markets to drop by 3,000 tons this year.

(la/dpa)