Afghanistan | Kabul drug addicts forcibly weaned

(Kabul) They have shaved heads, oversized tunics and stalked looks. For drug addicts rounded up by the Taliban under a bridge in Kabul or entrusted by their families to a rehabilitation center, 45 days of forced withdrawal begins.

Their cache is known to all. At Pul-e-Sukhta, the bridge under which the city spits out its sewage, drug addicts in Kabul live and die out of sight.

An intolerable presence for the new Taliban police who are increasing the raids.

Two fighters, armed with M16s and AK47s were sent this morning to shake up the amorphous figures in the middle of a pile of cushions, blankets, sandbags and syringes or crack pipes.

After a few warning shots, drug addicts are pushed unceremoniously in ambulances to the rehabilitation service of Ibn Sina hospital, located in a former military base.

The director of the center, the D^r Ahmad Zoher Sultani can accommodate a thousand patients. And there he empties the sea of ​​the national scourge with a teaspoon.

“Drugs are a terrible problem in our country, there are nearly four million drug addicts,” the doctor told AFP.

About 10% of the Afghan population is struggling with drugs, a world record confirmed by international surveys.

“This is the policy of the Islamic Emirate, they stop more. They want to cleanse the city of those who make it ugly. So as soon as we have places, they will look for them. Today, almost all of our 1,000 beds are occupied, ”he adds.

“At the moment, we are working for free, no one has been paid for four months. We hope things work out ”.

The “Rehabilitation” stay lasts 45 days and is more like a weaning during which the men spend their days lying on their beds, in collective rooms or dormitories, or squatting in the courtyards to enjoy the rays of the sun. ‘fall.

There is a little methadone for opium addicts, nothing for methamphetamine users, says D^r Sultani.

This morning Emal, 36, arrives dragging his feet in the recording room. A volunteer (they are often chosen from former residents) opens his register.

“To plunder us”

– What is your name ? Emal.

– Your father’s: Abdul Matin.

– Married? Yes. I have three children, two girls and a boy.

– You have a job ? Currently no.

– What drug are you taking? Crystal (methamphetamine).

– Have you ever been to the hospital? Yes, three times. This is the fourth. I was out 10 days ago.

Bilal Ahmad, 22, thin and fearful as an alley cat, takes his place on the chair. He also said he was addicted to “meth” and went through the program “a year ago, or a year and a half”.

“I’m happy to be here,” he assures AFP, throwing around him glances that say the opposite. “In 45 days, God willing, we can go home.”

The search is meticulous: folds of clothes, shoes, everything is inspected for drugs.

– Open the mouth. Bigger. Stick out the tongue.

In groups of six, they are then led into the tiled shower building, where they are given khaki outfits, long shirts and loose pants, a scoop of shampoo, no towel. They come out later, dripping, to pass into the agile hands of barbers who shave their hair, but not their beard.

This treatment gives them a family resemblance and it is as frightened siblings, hunched shoulders, hesitant gait, that they are taken to one of the buildings where they are allocated a five-bed room. Two nurses take their blood pressure, pulse and temperature.

The neighboring dormitory is occupied by about thirty men of all ages, lying on their blankets. One plays a childish tune on a bamboo transverse flute. Another, putting his hand to his mouth, signals that he is hungry.

However, the center has nearly a year of reserves and offers three meals a day, assures the D^r Sultani, showing a tour of a warehouse with shelves full of bags of rice and cans.

“We are in a poor neighborhood,” he says. “On August 15, the day Kabul fell to the Taliban, hundreds of people gathered at our doors to loot us. But we resisted, along with our patients. And we pushed them back. ”