Former Afghan general arrested and charged with drug and firearm offenses in U.S.

Washington — A former member of Afghanistan’s National Assembly was arrested and charged with conspiring to illegally import heroin and methamphetamine into the United States as well as firearm-related charges, according to court documents unsealed Friday. 

Abdul Zahir Qadeer, a former general in Afghanistan’s paramilitary Border Force and a former deputy speaker in the National Assembly, faces federal charges in the Southern District of New York. The charges include one count of conspiracy to import narcotics and two counts of conspiracy to possess machine guns and destructive devices.

He made an initial appearance in a New York courtroom on Friday and was ordered to be detained pending trial, a U.S. official told CBS News. 

According to an affidavit from a special agent with the Drug Enforcement Administration, Qadeer had been negotiating with a confidential source working with the DEA since November 2024. A month later, he allegedly sold a two-kilogram “test shipment” of methamphetamines to an associate of the DEA informant in South Africa. 

After the first shipment was delivered in exchange for $14,000, Qadeer continued to negotiate into 2025 with the informant to sell “hundreds of kilograms” of heroin and methamphetamine, the affidavit said. He also allegedly arranged to sell “hundreds” of assault rifles, heavy machine guns, pistols, rocket-propelled grenades and grenades, as well as thousands of rounds of ammunition.

In February 2025, the affidavit said that the informant told Qadeer that they planned to buy 500 to 600 kilograms of heroin and methamphetamine to sell in the United States, along with the weapons. Qadeer, who provided the informant with quotes for the weapons requested of him, allegedly responded that he was prepared to deliver all of the requested weapons and ammunition within three days of being given a delivery location.

In April 2025, Qadeer attended a meeting in Nairobi, Kenya, which he thought was a meeting with the drug trafficking organization the informant said they were working for, when in reality the meeting was with multiple DEA confidential sources. He was arrested after the meeting by Kenyan authorities, and was extradited to the United States on Friday.

“While purporting to be a political leader of Afghanistan, Abdul Zahir Qadeer was allegedly leading a criminal enterprise dealing in dangerous and addictive narcotics and heavy weapons,” Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said in a statement. “The Drug Enforcement Administration led an investigation that ended Qadeer’s audacious criminal activity, and now he will face justice in the United States.” 

If convicted, Qadeer faces a minimum of 10 years in prison for the drug-related charge, and a minimum of 30 years in prison for the weapon-related charges, with a maximum of life in prison for both charges. 

The Southern District of New York’s complaint against Qadeer comes more than a month after the indictment of Mohammad Baqer Saad Dawood Al-Saadi, an Iraqi national who allegedly plotted to carry out terror attacks in the U.S., including at a Jewish institution in New York, federal prosecutors said.