MPs slam UK record on controlling Afghan opium poppy harvest --- Attempts by successive governments to control the Afghan opium poppy harvest – the source of most of the heroin that reaches Britain – have been a spectacular failure, according to a report from a cross-party group of MPs published on Tuesday. -- As British troops prepare to leave Helmand province in southern Afghanistan, poppy cultivation is soaring to record levels and there is no sign that the Afghan government has the will or the means to tackle the problem, the Commons defence committee said. The report warns: "We are concerned that this will continue to fund organised crime and undermine the development of democratic government and governance." -- The committee suggests that in future, British aid to Afghanistan should be conditional on clear progress in developing viable alternatives to poppy farming. -- Ending the Afghan drugs trade was a key argument used by Tony Blair to justify deploying British troops to the country. He said in 2001: "The arms the Taliban buy are paid for by the lives of young British people buying their drugs. This is another part of the regime we should destroy." -- But Helmand province remains by far the largest opium poppy growing area and production has been rising significantly there over the past few years. Opium poppy cultivation in Afghanistan reached a record high in 2013, according to a survey by the UN. Cultivation amounted to some 209,000 hectares, outstripping the earlier record in 2007 of 193,000 hectares. -- Total opium production in 2013 increased by about 5,500 tonnes, a 49% increase over 2012. -- "The counter-narcotics strategy of the UK government in Afghanistan has failed", the Commons defence committee report concludes, adding it is imperative that the government carries out a thorough analysis of the lessons learned from Britain's military intervention in Afghanistan. -- Dai Havard, a senior member of the committee said: "After over 12 years of operations in Afghanistan, the British people quite rightly expect a thorough analysis. We need to examine whether the national decision-making, military command and governance arrangements for the campaign were appropriate, and what we need for future engagements." -- The committee said the study should "set out what the political ends were ... and judge whether the ways and means, diplomatic, economic and military, were sufficient". -- The MPs express concern that in the face of "a determined insurgency" the Afghan army's attrition rate of more than 30% a year – more than double the official target – could undermine efforts to maintain security in Afghanistan. The committee also warns that progress on the advancement of the rights of women and girls in Afghanistan was significant, but remained fragile. -- In a statement responding to the report, Philip Hammond, the defence secretary, said: "We can be proud of the contribution British forces have made to ensuring that the country cannot be used as a base for international terrorists to attack us and our interests" However, he added that the government "will want to look strategically across the campaign as a whole to see what longer term lessons need to be learned, once the mission is over." -- Separately, Margaret Hodge, chair of the Commons public accounts committee, has said huge uncertainties remained over Britain's defence budget. The MoD underspent by £1.2bn on its equipment plan, yet it had "no idea whether this is because of genuine savings or whether costs are simply being stored up for later years because of delays on projects", she said. - Guardian, http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/may/13/mps-slam-uk-record-afghan-opium-poppy-harvest