Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian Photo: fmprc.gov.cn

China expressed its appreciation for the Afghan interim government's move to ban cultivation of narcotics in Afghanistan and stated that the US should apologize and compensate for its dishonorable role in the Afghan drug problem, according to spokesperson of China's Foreign Ministry on Thursday. The Afghan interim government recently announced a ban on poppy cultivation throughout the country, along with a ban on the manufacturing, use and transportation of other narcotics. 

At a routine news conference on Thursday, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian expressed appreciation for the measures and China's willingness to continue deepening cooperation with Afghanistan and regional countries on anti-drug operations.

The foreign ministry spokesperson also noted that the US, the originator of the Afghan issue, played a very disgraceful role in the country's drug problem.

Zhao quoted reports that the US military presence in Afghanistan led to a worldwide drug laboratory program and massive increase in opiate production in Afghanistan.

US historian Alfred McCoy pointed out that the US heavily funded local guerrillas in Afghanistan through CIA channels in order to fight the Soviet Union, ignoring the fact that these men were operating a chain of heroin laboratories.  Charles Cogan, former director of CIA operations in Afghanistan, also said that the US had not really used its resources to investigate the drug trade in Afghanistan, Zhao noted at the press conference.

Zhao urged the US to reflect deeply on its actions, offer sincere apologies and make full reparations and take real action to make up for the harm done to the Afghan people.

"The 20 years of US interference in Afghanistan have been years of death and displacement of Afghan civilians and the barbaric growth of drugs there," Zhao said, noting that the US hasty withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan has left serious challenges such as drugs to innocent Afghan people.

Over 421,000 netizens signed the joint letter published by the Global Times in February demanding the US return life-saving money to the Afghans, after the US released a plan to unfreeze money from Afghanistan's central bank but use it for the US' needs in February, which outraged the international community.