Russia’s President proposes anti money-laundering zone around Afghanistan
In the middle of August, Russia’s president Vladimir Putin proposed to Asian leaders to set up financial security belts around Afghanistan with a view to counter money laundering. Also, he called for holding a special security conference on Afghanistan.
Recently, Putin was on a visit to Kyrgyzstan at a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), which has Russia, China, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan as its members and India, Pakistan, Iran and Mongolia as observers.
According to Putin, it is important to go on forming anti-drug security belts around Afghanistan, and these belts can be complemented with financial security belts supervised by financial monitors of SCO. He said that this will increase the effectiveness of measures used to fight both money laundering and drug trafficking.
As SCO member states want to ensure stability in Afghanistan, Putin proposed to hold a special conference aimed at discussing means of helping Afghanistan. He suggested that foreign ministers of SCO countries could make corresponding preparations.
In accordance with the World Drug Report, more than 90% of the world’s illegal opium production used to produce heroin is carried out in Afghanistan.
Afghanistan’s president Hamid Karzai asked SCO to prioritize measures against drug-trafficking, which is a major financial source for terrorism.