Pubdate: Mon, 18 Jun 2001 Source: National Post (Canada) Copyright: 2001 Southam Inc. Contact: http://www.nationalpost.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/286 Author: Peter Goodspeed FAST-GROWING DRUG TRADE ENVELOPS IRAN TEHRAN - A gram of heroin costs about USc40 here. That's cheaper than milk and almost as plentiful, and it is causing Iran's leaders no end of headaches. Sandwiched between Afghanistan, the world's biggest producer of opium, and the lucrative, but illegal drug markets of Europe and the Persian Gulf, Iran finds itself with a massive and growing drug problem. In the past decade, the Iranian authorities have seized a staggering 1.7 million kilos of drugs -- opium, heroin, morphine and hashish -- more than any other nation in the world, says the United Nations Drug Control Program. The annual haul is about 200 tonnes of opium and six tonnes of heroin. Police have found the contraband stuffed in books, woven into carpets or loaded on drug-addicted camels that are trained to travel alone across the desert. More often than not, the drugs are simply driven into the country aboard dozens of heavily armed convoys that seek to infiltrate Iran each day. Smugglers criss-cross the deserts along Iran's eastern borders with Afghanistan and Pakistan in a steady stream of camel caravans and four-wheel drive trucks. They are armed with machine guns, rocket launchers, anti-aircraft missiles, satellite telephones and night vision equipment. "The production of illicit drugs in Afghanistan is astonishingly high," says Mohammad Fallah, director of Iran's Drug Control Headquarters. "It flows from the country like water from the tap. We are having greater success in cutting down the flow. But our task is difficult." In just one day in early June, police seized more than a tonne of opium and 200 kilograms of morphine. They also killed nearly a dozen drug traffickers in a series of major gun battles. Iran averages 1,445 major armed confrontations with drug traffickers each year, with up to seven major gun battles taking place each day. In the past 20 years in what amounts to a low-key war, 3,100 Iranian police and soldiers have died in drug-related shootouts. Nearly 10,000 drug traffickers have been shot or executed. Last year, 183 police and 740 drug smugglers died in shootouts. Iran's war on drugs has become so far-reaching, that Kamal Aqaie, writing in the monthly magazine Payame Emrooz, an economic and cultural journal, estimates up to 30% of the country's security budget, 60% of its prison budget and 70% of the activities of the revolutionary courts are devoted to fighting drug traffickers. The traffickers also overload the country's prisons -- 70% of the 150,000 people behind bars are there for drug-related offences. Although police fear they are intercepting only about 20% of all the drugs in transit through Iran, they are still seizing sizeable amounts. Their heroin seizures alone amount to the combined annual street consumption of heroin in Britain and Italy. Still, tonnes of drugs manage to cross the border undetected. "Iran is the main gateway for illicit drugs from Afghanistan to the West," says Antonio Mazzitelli, the head of the United Nations' Drug Control Program office in Tehran. "It's the simplest and most direct route." According to the United Nations, Afghanistan accounts for 75% of the world's opium production and provides up to 90% of Europe's heroin. The drugs, which are a major source of income for the country's ruling Taleban militia, come into Iran daily, along the 1,800-kilometre porous border, which is mainly desert. Once in Iran, the drugs are rerouted to Turkey and the Balkans, and from there on to the Gulf states or Europe. In recent years, an alternative route has been developed to move drugs through Tajikistan and Russia into Eastern Europe, before going on to the West. Iran has already spent more than US$1-billion to try to seal its borders by building fortifications. It has blocked mountain passes with walls of concrete, and created hundreds of military outposts, observation towers and electric fencing. In recent months, it has also armed and trained thousands of villagers to combat heavily armed drug traffickers in their areas. This is in addition to deploying more than 30,000 combat troops and police along the eastern border. European nations, such as France and Britain, have started to supplement the Iranian government's anti-drug programs by offering aid in the form of drug-sniffing police dogs. They have also donated bullet-proof vests and night vision goggles. But so far, there has been little let-up in the smuggling of drugs. Iranian officials worry that up to 40% of the illegal drugs entering the country are being diverted to fuel growing demand from an ever-increasing pool of home-grown addicts. Hossein Dezhapam, the head of the Iranian Society for Combatting Illegal Drugs, told an addiction treatment seminar in Tehran recently the country has more than 1.2-million hard core drug addicts and another 800,000 casual drug users. - --- MAP posted-by: Andrew