Leaked Stratfor Emails Allege White House Ordered DEA to Halt Karzai Investigation
Internal emails from the U.S. private intelligence firm Stratfor, published by WikiLeaks, alleged that in 2007 the Bush administration and CIA instructed the Drug Enforcement Administration to abandon a major narcotics trafficking investigation into Ahmed Wali Karzai, the half-brother of Afghan President Hamid Karzai.
Ahmed Wali Karzai was a powerful political figure in southern Afghanistan who wielded considerable influence in Kandahar province before his assassination in July 2011. The leaked emails describe him as a significant narcotics trafficking figure who was under active DEA investigation.
Contents of the Stratfor Communications
In a June 6, 2007 email classified as confidential, Stratfor’s vice president of intelligence Fred Burton wrote that the DEA had been told to stand down from its investigation of Karzai’s brother for political reasons, with the directive coming from both the White House and the CIA. Burton noted that the DEA was identifying a direct connection between narcotics trafficking and terrorism in Afghanistan, with drug sales funding jihadist operations.
When asked by a Stratfor analyst about how close the Afghan president was to his half-brother, Burton characterized the relationship as close. He compared the situation to the case of Manuel Noriega, the Panamanian leader who was eventually overthrown and convicted on drug trafficking charges. Burton predicted that the DEA would eventually proceed with its case once the current administration left office.
CIA Payments to Ahmed Wali Karzai
The Stratfor revelations aligned with earlier reporting by the New York Times. In 2009, current and former American officials told the newspaper that Ahmed Wali Karzai had been receiving regular payments from the CIA since 2001. This arrangement raised questions about whether intelligence agencies were protecting a known narcotics figure in exchange for cooperation on counterterrorism and political stability objectives in southern Afghanistan.
Afghanistan’s Expanding Opium Trade
Despite the U.S. military presence in Afghanistan, the country’s opium production continued to grow during the period in question. Output rose by approximately 61 percent between 2010 and 2011, and continued increasing through 2012. During this same period, U.S. troops were documented patrolling poppy-growing regions, creating a visible contradiction between stated anti-narcotics policy and conditions on the ground.
The failure to curtail opium production — combined with allegations that high-level political figures involved in the drug trade were shielded from prosecution — raised fundamental questions about the priorities and internal conflicts within U.S. policy in Afghanistan.
Source of the Leaked Emails
The Stratfor emails were part of a larger cache of approximately five million internal communications dated between July 2004 and December 2011. The files were obtained by the hacker collective Anonymous around December 2011 and subsequently published by WikiLeaks. At the time of these revelations, WikiLeaks had released roughly 2,694 emails from the collection.
