Topic: Ahmed Wali

Ahmad Wali Khan Karzai, younger brother of Hamid Karzai, president of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is the representative for southern Afghanistan in Kandahar. Ahmad Wali Khan Karzai was chosen as a representative of Kandahar province for the 2002 Loya jirga and also the 2004 Constitutional Loya Jirga. He was elected to the Kandahar Provincial Council in 2005.

Karzai is also an elder of the Popalzais, a Pashtun clan. It has been alleged that he is a prominent figure in the drug trade, controlling a significant proportion of Afghan heroin production. Numerous reports link Ahmed Wali Karzai to the drug trade, according to current and former officials from the White House, the State Department and the United States Embassy in Afghanistan, who would speak only on the condition of anonymity. In meetings with President Karzai, including a 2006 session with the United States ambassador, the Central Intelligence Agency’s station chief and their British counterparts, American officials have talked about the allegations in hopes that the president might move his brother out of the country, said several people who took part in or were briefed on the talks.

“We thought the concern expressed to Karzai might be enough to get him out of there,” one official said. But President Karzai has resisted, demanding clear-cut evidence of wrongdoing, several officials said. “We don’t have the kind of hard, direct evidence that you could take to get a criminal indictment,” a White House official said. “That allows Karzai to say, ‘where’s your proof?’ ”.