What are the sources of financing of the Taliban in Afghanistan and how they managed to be “flooded with cash”

Just four months after US President Joe Biden announced the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, the Taliban took control of Kabul, nearly 20 years after the group was ousted from power by NATO forces.

Few people expected it to happen so quickly. Although a Taliban resurgence has been warned if the US military withdraws, arrived in Kabul in just nine days. The Afghan army, largely trained by US forces but stunned by exhaustion and corruption, could not contain the group and, in many cases, moved away without firing a single shot.

One of the biggest questions surrounding the Taliban after taking power so quickly is how they found the money to take control and run the country.

Experts say the Taliban get their funding from a variety of sources. Some of the money comes from the opium trade and drug trafficking, or other crimes such as smuggling. In addition, the group taxes and extorts farms and other businesses, and extremists participate in kidnappings for ransom.

The group also receives donations from a wide range of benefactors who support its cause or view it as a useful asset, experts say.

“They are overflowing with cash”Gretchen Peters, executive director of the Center for Illicit Networks and Organized Crime, told NPR, the US public service broadcaster. “The Taliban have earned much more for nearly two decades from drug trafficking and other illicit activities, ranging from extortion shenanigans and timber trafficking, artisanal mining and kidnapping plans.

There are different factions of the Taliban: some, located In the drug-intensive areas of southern and western Afghanistan, such as Kandahar and Helmand, they are more dependent on drug trafficking to finance their operations. But others, like those in the east and south-east, tend to make money through other means, such as extortion, kidnapping and timber trafficking.Peters added.

While it’s unclear exactly how much money the Taliban comes in each year, a recent United Nations report estimated it to be between $ 300 million and $ 1.6 billion.

“The main sources of funding for the Taliban remain the Criminal activitiessuch as drug trafficking, extortion, kidnapping for ransom, mining and income from tax collection in areas under the control or influence of the Taliban, ”the report said.

Hanif Sufizada, who studied Taliban finance as an economic policy analyst at the Center for Afghanistan Studies, calculated in dialogue with Fox News that the group had $ 416 million from drugs – Afghanistan has accounted for about 84% of global opium production over the past five years, according to the United Nations – and about $ 400 million from iron ore mining, marble, copper, gold, zinc and other rare metals and minerals of the earth.

In addition, the group imposes a 10% tax on all links in the drug production chain, According to a report from the Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit, an independent research organization based in Kabul that includes farmers who grow poppy, the main ingredient in opium, laboratories that turn it into drugs, and traders who bring out the poppy. the end product of the country. .

According to the survey, the militant group received an additional $ 160 million through extortion and taxes; 240 million USD from private donors and international institutions, many of which are found in the countries of the Persian Gulf; $ 240 million in staple exports used to launder illicit money, such as auto parts and reassembled vehicles; and $ 80 million in real estate.

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