Moscow, Jan 27 (IANS/RIA Novosti) Annual financial damage to the world economy from drug money equals $2 trillion, Russia’s Federal Drug Control Service head Viktor Ivanov said.

“Narco-dollars form a market with a volume of over $500 billion annually, while negative consequences for the real economy exceed this amount two or three times over. The annual damage to the world economy amounts to $2 trillion,” Ivanov said in his speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, late Thursday.

“This amount equals the levels of gross domestic product in such countries as France and the United Kingdom,” he added quoting UN experts’ information.

Drug money has become a necessary part of the international monetary system and one of the sources of the financial crisis. The world’s largest banks depend on “dirty” but liquid money from drug sales and indirectly encourage the further production of drugs.

As for drug trafficking from Afghanistan, Ivanov said that criminals receive $65 billion from Afghan drug sales per year which leads to $200 billion in annual damage to the world economy.

“A key point to liquidate international drug production is to reform the current economy and turn to an economy without drug money with guarantees for clear liquid assets, in other words, to the economy of development,” the drug service head also said.

–IANS/RIA Novosti
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