Drug baron flees as Paras swoop

ONE of Afghanistan's most wanted drug lords is on the run after escaping a massive airborne assault by British paratroopers, American Green Berets and elite Afghan commandos.

The opium baron Mullah Multan, who has close links to the Taleban, fled along underground tunnels after hundreds of Nato troops stormed into his headquarters in southern Afghanistan last week.

It was the biggest raid against an Afghan drugs target since 2001, but the troops failed to make any significant arrests.

Afghan commandos, from the country's counter-narcotics force, and troops from 3rd Battalion, the Parachute Regiment, spearheaded the operation, code-named Operation Southern Beast, by swooping on a series of compounds at the heart of Multan's heroin empire.

The troops were backed up by unmanned Predator drones, fighter jets and Apache gunships.

But Multan, Afghanistan's fifth most wanted drugs boss, managed to give the slip to more than 1,000 Nato troops, including Britain's Household Cavalry and the Canadian Light Infantry, who launched perimeter patrols around the raids.

Denis Thompson, the Canadian brigadier who was in charge of the operation, admitted: "You have never got 100 per cent intelligence."

The Afghan commandos used Russian Mi-8 helicopters to land a few metres away from Multan's headquarters, in Maywand district in Kandahar province, while a fleet of RAF Chinooks took the Paras to a cluster of compounds about nine kilometres away, where his top lieutenants were hiding out.

Maywand is where 25,000 Afghan warriors smashed the British Indian army in 1880, killing 969 soldiers and injuring a further 177, in one of the worst defeats of the Anglo-Afghan wars. Today, the area is Kandahar's main opium growing area.

The Scotsman joined 3 Para on the first Chinook to touch down, less than 200 metres from where Multan's men were located, but the insurgents fled at the first sound of the helicopters.

The Green Berets called in fighter jets, which were already on stand-by, to drop a 500lb bomb on a convoy they spotted racing away from the raids. But army commanders are convinced Multan made it out alive after ordering his men to flee.

The raids went awry because Multan had left his compound only moments after the helicopters took off from Kandahar airbase.

The Commandos wanted to postpone the operation until he had stopped moving, so they could land "on top of him", but the Chinooks were running out of fuel.

Major Matt Cansdale, who led the 3 Para assault, said: "We were running out of fuel. We either had to do it then, or not for an hour because we would have had to refuel and come back."

At the last minute, Afghan commandos made the decision to strike, rather than risk losing sight of their man.

They landed at Multan's last known position – but it was almost half a mile off target.

Brigadier Thompson said: "He was around 700 metres from the compound when they came in."

Apache gunships with "eyes on" the Paras' raid warned them there were fighters in the area. A handwritten note was passed along the two lines of soldiers huddled shoulder to shoulder on the floor of each Chinook, warning them a fight was likely. None of them looked disappointed.

At exactly 8:45am, three Chinooks full of airborne soldiers swooped into the desert next to an inauspicious collection of mud compounds.

The troops stormed out of the choppers in seconds, instantly fanning out and ready to return fire in all directions. But moments earlier, the men they had been set to engage had abandoned their weapons and fled – some on foot, others in cars or on motorbikes.

Intelligence reports later revealed Multan had ordered his men to escape instead of staying to fight.

"The only way to stop them escaping is to encircle them immediately," Major Cansdale said. But the Paras had landed on only two sides because they were expecting a scrap and didn't want to split their force and risk a friendly fire incident.

"You don't know whether the people in there are going to fight against you or try and escape," Major Cansdale said. "If you land on every side, you land light and you risk a blue on blue (friendly-fire incident]."

The Paras discovered almost 70kg of half-processed brown heroin in sacks on the back seat of an abandoned car, close to where they landed.

They also found a cache of medical supplies in a makeshift clinic, a wad of Pakistani rupees, an anti-aircraft gun, some ammunition and two optical sights for rocket propelled grenades.

Sergeant Pete Reynolds, who discovered the drugs, said: "It's frustrating more than anything. The blokes were all psyched up, but they ran away when they heard us coming."

Senior military sources fear Multan may have fled into the Taleban heartlands in Helmand province. They suspect he has close links to the insurgents in Sangin, where 2 Para has been taking a hammering at the hands of the insurgents.

The area is a known narcotics hub, where raw opium collected from along the Helmand valley is processed into heroin.

The sources also believe Multan has a number of corrupt Afghan security officials on his payroll, and that they let him pass unchallenged through checkpoints between Kandahar and Helmand.

BACKGROUND

AFGHAN government forces are soon to take over responsibility for the security of the capital, Kabul, officials said yesterday, in a move that reflects the growing strength of the country's army and police.

While Taleban attacks have surged this year, with more suicide and roadside bombs and more people killed than at any time since 2001, Afghan forces are steadily growing in size, and Kabul has seen fewer attacks in 2008 than in the same period last year.

Some 70,000 foreign troops are in Afghanistan, fighting a Taleban insurgency that aims to overthrow the pro-western government of Hamid Karzai. Nato's International Security Assistance Force (Isaf) is currently in overall charge of security in the capital.

Neither the Afghan defence ministry nor Isaf gave a precise date for the handover.

Some 2,500 people, including about 1,000 civilians, have been killed this year, aid agencies say, and each of the past three months has seen more violent incidents than any month since the Taleban was overthrown in 2001.