Fri Mar 4, 2005 08:31 PM ET

(Reuters) - Afghan heroin production represents an "an enormous threat to world stability" and the country is "on the verge of becoming a narcotics state," the U.S. State Department said in a report released on Friday.

Despite steps by the Afghan government and foreign donors, the U.S. International Narcotics Control Strategy Report found the Afghan "narcotics situation continues to worsen" more than three years after U.S.-led forces toppled the Taliban regime.

The most dramatic conclusions in the report, an annual survey of the world drug trade, were about Afghanistan, where it praised U.S.-backed President Hamid Karzai's efforts, but said Afghan poppy cultivation more than tripled last year.

I might be wrong, but doesn't drug trafficking help support terrorism? We sure have a firm hold of that country. (hat tip Editerette)