April 25 (Bloomberg) -- Federal agents arrested Haji Bashir Noorzai, an Afghan drug lord with close ties to the Taliban, the country's former religious rulers, U.S. Attorney David Kelley announced today.

Noorzai was indicted by a grand jury in New York on charges of conspiring to import $50 million worth of heroin from Afghanistan and Pakistan into the U.S. and other countries. Noorzai was arrested in the U.S. by agents of the Drug Enforcement Administration as he was traveling to New York.

``Afghanistan is the world's largest manufacturer and supplier of heroin, and Noorzai was certainly on the upper rung of that hierarchy,'' Kelley said today at a press conference in Manhattan.

Noorzai had an ``unholy alliance'' with deposed Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar, trading drugs and weapons for protection of his operation, Kelley said. Last June President George W. Bush described Noorzai as a ``drug kingpin'' under the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act, which targets individuals who pose ``a threat to the national security, foreign policy, or economy of the United States,'' Kelley said.

The indictment was unsealed today. Noorzai will be arraigned on the charges in Manhattan federal court this afternoon.

`Escobar of Heroin'

John Gilbride, special agent in charge of the New York office of the DEA, called Noorzai the ``Pablo Escobar of heroin trafficking in Asia,'' referring to the former leader of Colombia's Medellin cocaine cartel. Escobar died in 1993.

Since 1990, Noorzai controlled fields in Afghanistan where poppies were grown and harvested to generate opium, according to the indictment. Noorzai's organization used laboratories in Afghanistan and Pakistan to process the opium into heroin, the indictment said.

``Noorzai and the Taliban had a symbiotic relationship,'' Kelley said. The Taliban ``protected his drug operations in return for demolitions, weaponry and manpower.''

In 1990 Noorzai met with unnamed co-conspirators in Karachi, Pakistan, and offered to provide heroin for distribution in New York, according to the indictment.

In 1997, Taliban officials seized a truckload of morphine base owned by Noorzai, according to the indictment. Upon learning it was his, they returned it to Noorzai ``with personal apologies from Mullah Mohammad Omar,'' the indictment said.

Al-Qaeda Link

Congressman Mark Steven Kirk, an Illinois Republican who traveled to Afghanistan in February 2004, said Noorzai supplied aides to al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden with 2,000 kilograms of heroin ``every eight weeks.''

Kelley would not confirm a link to bin Laden, and no mention is made of it in the indictment.

Noorzai's operation yields $28 million a year, Kirk said, and is believed to be bin Laden's major heroin supplier, according to a November 2004 report by the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

If he's convicted, Noorzai faces up to life in prison, Kelley said. Prosecutors are seeking forfeiture of $50 million in illegal drug proceeds from Noorzai.

The case is U.S. v. Noorzai, 05-CR-19, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York.

To contact the reporter on this story: David E. Rovella in New York drovella@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: April 25, 2005 13:11 EDT