US embassy cable - 05DHAKA102

UNCLAS DHAKA 000102 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: SNAR, PGOV, BG, Narcotics 
SUBJECT: NARCOTICS ABUSE IN BANGLADESH ON THE RISE 
 
 
1. (U) Summary: The number of Bangladeshi drug addicts is 
rising.  While the media often focus on small-time dealers 
and destitute addicts, staff and a recovering addict at one 
NGO claim abuse is growing fastest among the relatively 
affluent, including college females.  End Summary. 
 
2. (U) There is no consensus number of drug addicts in 
Bangladesh, but some estimates go as high as 2.5 million. 
Local media regularly report on narcotics markets, primarily 
heroin, opium, and phensidyl, and their customers living on 
the fringes of urban society.  More uncommon is reporting on 
relatively affluent abusers, though one article quoted a 
university proctor as saying drugs on campus is "an open 
secret." 
 
SIPDIS 
 
3. (SBU) Econoff recently met with Brother Ronald Drahozal, 
his deputy director, and a recovering addict of APON, 
Bangladesh's only 12-step substance abuse recovery program. 
They agreed that illicit drug usage in Bangladesh is 
escalating, but said that it cuts across socio-economic 
lines.  The recovering addict, who spoke good English and 
appeared educated, stated that by the time he was 13, he and 
50 percent of his classmates had experimented with cannabis 
and alcohol.  By the time they were in high school, they had 
all moved on to injectable opiates, he said. 
 
4. (SBU) Female university students, econoff was told, are 
increasingly performing opportunistic sex work to finance 
their drug habits and live fashionably.  Asked why females 
from good backgrounds would begin abusing drugs in the first 
place, the NGO staff and the recovering addict suggested the 
women had been negatively influenced by female flat mates or 
male students. 
 
5. (SBU) Comment: APON, a well regarded NGO and a former INL 
beneficiary, has an interest in communicating the worsening 
drug problem in Bangladesh.  Yet, no one disputes that abuse 
here is a growing problem, that drug education in schools is 
inadequate, and that at least some of the widespread criminal 
violence in Bangladesh -- including arms trafficking in the 
Chittagong Hill Tracts -- is narcotics related. 
Acknowledgment of the problem is a notable step in a 
conservative, Islamic society.  Bangladesh's imams proved to 
be valuable partners in our anti-human trafficking programs, 
and if properly approached they might be equally useful in 
anti-substance abuse initiatives. 
THOMAS