ISLAMABAD: The fight against drugs and illicit contraband is a priority for Pakistan, and the United States government and international community recognise that Pakistan faces special challenges because of its neighbourhood, US Assistant Secretary of State for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs Todd Robinson said on Saturday.

“But when we work together, we achieve great things,” the assistant secretary said in a statement issued at the end of his four-day visit to Pakistan. The visit marked seventy-five years of US-Pakistan relations and forty-year partnership of INL with Pakistan under the theme, “justice, security and prosperity”.

The US official held discussions with senior government officials on US-Pakistan cooperation on several topics, including counter-narcotics, gender issues, transnational crime, and border security, says a US embassy press release.

The assistant secretary attended a ceremony to celebrate the delivery of commodities worth $1.44 million to the Excise, Taxation and Narcotics Control of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, the provincial agency that has a drug interdiction mandate.

He also participated in the ground-breaking of the Anti-Narcotics Force Academy (ANF) construction and training project in Islamabad, valued at $2.2 million, hosted by implementing partner United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). He thanked UNDP and ANF for their efforts and partnership with INL

Published in Dawn, July 3rd, 2022