Afghanistan's two most senior Counter Narcotics Judges are visiting the UK for the first time to meet leading Criminal Justice experts and learn more about contemporary approaches to counter narcotics law enforcement.
Judge Sangari is the Head of the Primary Court of the Criminal Justice Task Force (CJTF), and Judge Mehro heads the Appeal Court. Judge Mehro was appointed following the assassination of her predecessor, Judge Halim, in September 2008.

They met the Justice Secretary Jack Straw, who said,

"I am delighted to meet Judges Mehro and Sangari, who have been working in an enormously challenging environment to secure convictions against individuals who previously acted with impunity.

These judges risk their lives to tackle the drugs trade in Afghanistan and to demonstrate that no one is above justice.

An effective justice system is crucial to stemming radicalisation and fighting the Taliban. We will always support the independence and determination of the Afghan judiciary to uphold the law in the eyes of the Afghan people."In partnership with the UK, the Criminal Justice Task Force has prosecuted cases involving 33 tons of narcotics in the last six months alone."

On their visit, the Judges will be meeting with members of the Supreme Court and the Lord Chief Justice for Northern Ireland. They will also meet officers from the Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) to discuss SOCA's experience of investigating the top end of the drugs trade in the UK.

Although the focus of the CJTF's work is on narcotics, this is also a very important part of the international community's wider counter-insurgency strategy. Traffickers fund corruption and are known to work in partnership with the Taliban and others, to aid the passage of their drugs. The latest studies by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) estimate that up to £100 million a year from the drugs trade in Afghanistan is used to fund the insurgency.

Background

The Criminal Justice Task Force (CJTF) was established in 2005 and co-locates 35 investigators, 30 prosecutors and 14 judges, with a statutory mandate to deal with all significant narcotics cases. As part of the UK's commitment on counter narcotics, the UK provides funding of £2m a year to the task force. This includes salary support and a security package for its staff. Our support also includes embedded British advisers advising and mentoring their Afghan partners and we have recently introduced a case-tracking system that guards against improper influence.

In 2008-09 the CJTF primary court dealt with 236 cases from across Afghanistan involving 393 defendants. 259 were convicted, a conviction rate of 66%.

In July of this year the CJTF convicted its first high-value target, Haji Abdullah, who was the head of Afghanistan's third largest trafficking network. This success reflects the 'cradle to grave' approach on counter narcotics crime, with UK mentoring of law enforcement capabilities. Mentoring also supports the Afghan prosecution and trial process and we have arrangements in place to ensure that detention in special secure units follows conviction.

HM Prison Service also has a number of staff in Afghanistan overseeing the construction of a new Afghan prison service. Vicky Blakeman, a prison governor in the England/Wales Prison Service will be in charge of the building programme and will then run the prisons.

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