Juma Khan, an ethnic Baluch from Afghanistan's Nimroz Province, is a drug lord with links to the Taliban.^[1]

Juma Khan was an illiterate provincial drug smuggler from southwestern Afghanistan in the 1990s. He suddenly rose to national prominence after the American-led invasion of Afghanistan. He was briefly detained by American forces after the 2001 fall of the Taliban and released, even though American officials knew that he was involved in narcotics trafficking.^[2] After being released, he inexplicably seized control of the town of Bahramcha in the Chagai Hills on the Pakistan-Iran-Afghanistan border in late 2001 and turned it into a hub of drug smuggling and gun running into Pakistan and Iran. Later Juma Khan allegedly went on to run the Taliban's opium and heroin distribution network, selling worldwide and using the profits to equip Taliban forces militarily.^[3]

His organization was designated as a Narcotics Kingpin under the SDN by the United States Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control, with addresses in Pakistan and Afghanistan.^[4]

In 2008, he was detained for unknown reasons in Indonesia and transported to New York. He was quietly released on April 20, 2018, without any pending charges or a trial.^[5][6] No official explanation was provided.