Afghanistan remains top global heroin supplier: Turkish police report

ISLAMABAD: Afghanistan remained the world’s largest supplier of heroin and other opiates, with the Balkan route experiencing the highest intensity of trafficking, according to the Turkish Drug Report 2025 released this week.

The report stated, “Afghanistan continues to be the largest supplier country globally for the trafficking and production of heroin and other opiates.”

It noted that trafficking routes through the Balkans and southern and northern corridors remained the most frequently used. Among these, the Balkan route, which passed through Türkiye, had “the highest intensity of use.”

Historically, the Balkan route had been the principal channel for moving Afghan opiates to Western and Central Europe. From Afghanistan, drugs passed through Iran and Türkiye before splitting into three main branches.

Political changes in Afghanistan, which in April 2021 supplied about 80% of the global illegal opioid market, had led to “significant decreases in the supply of opioids in drug markets, especially heroin,” the report said.

In response, there had been an increase in synthetic opioid derivatives in Europe and pharmacies, including “fentanyl analogs and nitazenes,” which had increasingly been linked to serious health risks and fatalities.

Türkiye, located on the Balkan route, continued to play a key role in heroin seizures. While total seizures in 2024 were lower than in previous years, the report highlighted a “31% increase compared to the previous year, reaching 4.3 tons.”

The report attributed this rise primarily to a “19% increase in opium cultivation areas in Afghanistan” in 2024.

“Despite the political developments in recent years, Afghanistan continued to be the country that supplied the most illegal opiates to illegal drug markets worldwide,” the report emphasized. Opium poppy cultivation in Afghanistan expanded from 10,800 hectares in 2023 to 12,800 hectares in 2024.

Following the Taliban’s bans on opium, the report anticipated that “continent-based drug trafficking groups may turn to the trafficking of different drug types” to offset profit losses from declining heroin supplies.