Leaked Docs: Karzai Freed Connected Drug Dealers

Amid calls on Capitol Hill to try Wikileaks' founder Julian Assange on espionage charges, the latest batch of revelations by his company's leak of classified diplomatic cables claims that Afghan President Hamid Karzai freed suspected drug dealers because of their political connections.

A secret diplomatic cable released Tuesday by WikiLeaks says Afghan President Hamid Karzai freed dangerous detainees and pardoned suspected drug dealers because they had connections to powerful figures.

The cable, which supports the multiple allegations of corruption within the Karzai government, said that despite repeated rebukes from U.S. officials in Kabul, the president and his attorney general authorized the release of detainees.

"Both authorize the release of detainees pretrial and allow dangerous individuals to go free or re-enter the battlefield without ever facing an Afghan court," said the cable written on Aug. 6, 2009 by Frank Ricciardone, deputy U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan.

Karzai's spokesman Waheed Omar did not immediately respond to a request for comment. He said on Monday that the release of documents would not strain U.S.-Afghan relations.

The cable said that in April 2009 Karzai pardoned five Afghan policemen caught with 273 pounds (124 kilograms) of heroin because they were related to two heroic figures of the Afghan civil war fought in the mid-1990s.

The policemen were tried, convicted and each was sentenced to 16 to 18 years in prison, but Karzai "pardoned all five of them on the grounds that they were distantly related to two individuals who had been martyred during the civil war," the cable said.

According to the cable, Karzai also tampered with the narcotics case of Haji Amanullah, the son of a wealthy businessman and one of the president's supporters.

"Without any constitutional authority, Karzai ordered the police to conduct a second investigation which resulted in the conclusion that the defendant had been framed," Ricciardone wrote.

He wrote that intelligence reports indicated that Karzai also was planning to release Ismail Safad, a drug trafficker sentenced to 19 years in jail. Safad was a priority target for the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency who was arrested in 2005 with large quantities of heroin and weapons.

Abdul Makhtar, deputy director of the Afghan prison department, said Safad was still incarcerated at Pul-i Charkhi prison, the main detention facility in Kabul.

CBS News' Chip Reid reports that even though espionage laws are outdated, the U.S. may charge Wikileaks founder Julian Assange with them anyway.

"The Justice Department is expected to push ahead, arguing that the Wikileak documents put U.S. Intelligence assets at risk around the world," Reid reported on The Early Show. "One document, about a suspected shipment of nuclear equipment to iran, describes an Iranian intelligence source as a former national fencing champion of Iran, almost surely enough to put his life in jeopardy."

More on the Wikileaks Diplomatic Cables:

Wikileaks Sends U.S. Scrambling Over Security
Leaked Cables Reveal Locations of European Nukes
Hoekstra on WikiLeaks: "A Number of Time Bombs"
Outrage Over Wikileaks
The WikiLeaks Impact
WikiLeaks Releases State Dept. Documents
Key GOP Pol: WikiLeaks a Terrorist Group
Ahmadinejad Dismisses WikiLeaks Cable "Mischief"
U.S. Cables: Iran Armed Hezbollah Via Ambulances
Hoekstra: World's Trust in U.S. Now at Risk
U.S. Encouraged Diplomats to Spy, Leaks Show
Leaked Cables Shine Light on Iran Nuclear Threat
Worldwatch: Embarrassing Revelations Abound
Worldwatch: Diplomatic Shockers
White House Condemns WikiLeaks' Document Release
WikiLeaks Defies U.S., Releases Embassy Cables

Links to Leaked Cables:

Cables Shine Light Into Secret Diplomatic Channels (NYT)
The US Embassy Cable (Guardian)
A Superpower's View of the World (Spiegel, in English)
Los papeles del Departamento de Estado (El Pais)
Wikileaks: Dans les coulisses de la diplomatie americaine (Le Monde)

[thetruthwillout]

Hamid Karzai is as corrupt as the day is long. We are deluding ourselves by pouring millions of dollars into his grimy little hands under the guise of calling him an ally. He is not an ally. He is a double agent, working both sides against the middle and collecting big bucks from the stupid and trusting United States. People just don't get it. Money does not buy the loyalty of allies. They smile in your face while stabbing you in the back. We need to get out of that hell hole and let Karzai fend for himself. Once we're out, they'll take him out, believe me. He is being protected by the U.S. government and he knows it. He plays us like a fiddle and we go along, spending millions of dollars in his country while we are drowning in a recession in ours. It makes no sense. We are fools!

[jsf14]

I'm sure I read about these incidents before the cables were published. This confirms what we knew about Karzai, but it's not new.

[TheBackDoorman]

All our country is doing is Bush's clownish idiotic foolish demented unnecessary two DigiNet Vietnam's is stir up a hornets nest. Attacking terrorist with an army is like deer hunting with tanks. Terrorist live amongst civilians, hidden in small apartments and isolated houses. All Bush, cheney and Rumsfield accomplished was to shame our flag with lies' torture and shock and awing of the innocent inbetween the hunt for the fly. We all want the terrorist in chains but not in the evil way Bush chose. Women and children massacred in the middle of the night as they slept, their father's, brother's, son's and daughter's killed fighting to protect their home's and way of life. Bush's tactics have only served the terrorist and has endanger the world in many way's. Afghanastan is the poorest country on the face of the earth and on 911 had no army to fight us. It was reported last week on this site that 90% of the Taliban we're persecuting have no idea 911 ever happened. These shoeless poor people can't even afford a simple radio, or live is isolation from the rest of the world. That's why I say Bush, Cheney and the rest of the Corporate Oil Baron puppets have only empowered and served the terrorist interests by killing the innocent, torturing and invading two poor, backward countries that most had no idea of 911 with no ties to terrorism. Afghanastan is pathetic country, where the common man struggles to put shoes on his children's backs, yet Bush shock and awes them and ransacks every home. What would we do if any country did that to us. Our country is on it's knee's almost broke and extremely less safe. Not because of the terrorist but because of a recovering addicts weak, demented foolish mind.

[ddaryl]

pretty much sums it up.. but now your not a true patriot.

To be a true patriot you need to accept the crap they feed us regarding war and terror.. then you're truly a real American.

if you question this country then you are a socialist liberal pig.

All I have to say if Oink !

[pondcaster]

So,... how is this news? Confirmation of the obvious, I suppose?

[James93x]

Afghanistan earns a fine profit from the sale of poppies. This is an opportunity to increase harvests for revenue. Kabul could afford to handle security without NATO.

[lilbear925]

So, now we really know what is important to Hamid Karzai -- maintaining his supply of drugs.

[ddaryl]

of course it was about the money. we're talking 100's of millions to billion$$$

I bet the farm our own country has officials in high places trafficking drugs to our own people to fund their agenda.

Never under estimate any humans lust for power and money... this country is loaded to the gills with greed and power ******

[tsigili]

Everyone knows Karzai is corrupt.