The Taliban Raked in a Cool $400 Mill Last Year: UN Report

Who sez it doesn't pay to be a fanatical jihadi living in a godforsaken, backward kleptocracy? According to a new report, the payoff is huge:

The Taliban raised about $400 million last year from sources that included donations, taxing local economies and extorting money from such targets as drug dealers, cell phone operators and aid projects, according to a U.N. report on the militant Islamist group released on Tuesday. 

The report to the U.N. Security Council by the sanctions monitoring team said that about $275 million of that income reached Taliban leadership and the rest was collected, spent or misappropriated at the local level.

"The team understands Taliban funding as follows: revenue raised from taxing the local economy serves primarily to support local operations and is only in a few cases channeled upwards," the report said.

"Revenue extorted from nation-wide enterprises such as narcotics producers and traffickers, construction and trucking companies, mobile telephone operators, mining companies and aid and development projects goes to the Taliban Financial Commission which answers to the Taliban leadership," it said.

Donations were another major source of funding, which also went directly to the Taliban leadership.

The estimate covers the financial year ended March 20, 2012...

Sounds like the Taliban has more of a handle on the key to economic success than, say, Barack Obama does. ;)