Taliban-funding Afghan drug lord jailed for life in US

Washington, June 13 (ANI): An Afghan man found guilty of running one of the world's largest heroin trafficking rings and funding the Taliban has been jailed for life in the US.

Haji Bagcho, 70, denied making heroin along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border and sending it to over 20 countries.

A judge, however, said Bagcho channelled an 'astronomical' amount of drugs and the maximum sentence was appropriate.

"Haji Bagcho led a massive drug production and trafficking operation that supplied heroin in more than 20 countries, including the United States," the BBC quoted Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer, as saying.

"In 2006 alone, he conducted heroin transactions worth more than $250 million. Bagcho used the profits of his narcotics trafficking operation to support high-level Taliban commanders in Afghanistan," the judge said.

"Today's life sentence is an appropriate punishment for one of the most notorious heroin-traffickers in the world," he added.

Bagcho was convicted on 13 March 2012 after a three-week trial on charges of conspiracy and distribution of heroin for illegal import into the US, and narco-terrorism.

He is the second person to be convicted under the narco-terrorism statute, which makes it a crime to use money from the sale of drugs to finance terrorist activities. (ANI)