After the mid-18th century, when the British East India Co. was importing tea from China, few could have guessed that the industry would be revolutionized by a different plant: the opium poppy. Over ...

NEW DELHI, (IANS) – Opium nearly smoked out China, made Britain acquire tainted wealth, laid the foundation of the fortunes of many a notorious trading house, and made several early 19th-century ...

(AP) One Halloween night, in a blacked-out bedroom in Bangkok’s Chinatown, Steven Martin went into physical and mental free fall. High fever oscillated with shivering cold, gut-wrenching stomach pains ...

How many times this week had he gone to see the dragon? Five? Six? Ten? Fitz had lost count. But he reckoned he went to the den almost every night and paid Ton, the scraggly opium dealer with a ...

SARAB, Afghanistan (AP) — Open the door to Islam Beg's house and the thick opium smoke rushes out into the cold mountain air, like steam from a bathhouse. It's just past 8 a.m. and the family of six — ...