Read the text to fulfil the tasks. Ten years ago, when restoration of the Great Silk Road was started, the country-participants were eager to create a short route connecting Asia and Europe

Ten years ago, when restoration of the Great Silk Road was started, the country-participants were eager to create a short route connecting Asia and Europe. However, the transport corridor has increased not only favorable trade and economic relations between countries, but also the work of customs and law enforcement officials due to the rise in illegal drug trafficking.

In January 2007, the International Conference on Combating Illicit Drug Trafficking via the “Great Silk Route” brought together representatives of 14 countries, the World Customs Organization (WCO) and the European Commission.

“Currently, there are people who wish to use the Great Silk Route with the malicious intention of abusing the economic integrity between countries, and try to increase illicit drug trafficking by way of it,” stated the Head of the Department on Work with Law-enforcement Bodies of the Presidential Administration, Fuad Aleskerov. The Azeri government, recognizing the eradication of illegal drug smuggling as a national goal, expressed its support of the efforts of the international community in this direction. The Secretary General of the World Customs Organization (WCO), Michel Danet, admitted that narcotics’ trafficking was a problem in the occupied territories of Azerbaijan. “Uncontrolled territories could be viewed as an open market and everything could be happening there,” he said and noted that the WCO was not able to resolve the occupation, because it was responsible only for customs issues. At the same time, Danet stated that the WCO would be willing to help Azerbaijan with controlling the drug traffic. Guliyev said that controlling the Azeri-Iranian border would prove to be a complicated undertaking for the law-enforcement bodies of Azerbaijan. He stated that 60 percent of drugs seized by Azeri customs came from Iran and that they had uncovered one case of drugs coming from Turkmenistan.

Head of the State Frontier Service Elchin Guliyev informed reporters that Azeri frontier guards had taken steps to organize an adequate counteraction to international terrorism, illegal migration and narcotic traffic. He noted that the largest consignment of narcotics they caught had weighed six kilograms and was intended for transit across the Azeri-Iranian border. The State Frontier Service caught the shipment in the course of special operations in Yardimli province.

M. Danet also stated that Afghanistan constitutes a threat to the world as one of the main places of drug production and distribution. He said that there are two main routes for drug traffic from Asia to Europe. One of them lies from Afghanistan through Kazakhstan and Russia to the Balkan countries and into West Europe, and the other- from Afghanistan and Iran through the Balkans into Europe. Both directions are complicated to control, because 6,500 km-long Kazakhstan-Russian border passes over mountains, and the Iran-Afghanistan border passes through a desert.

Participants at the conference signed the Baku Declaration and expressed a willingness to strengthen interstate cooperation in the struggle against illicit drug traffic. Danet suggested that a program be drawn up specifying the next joint actions in this direction. He emphasized the importance of finding new tools in the anti-drug fight, because of the growing illegal turnover of drugs.

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