TEHRAN – Khorasan-e Razavi Province’s anti-narcotic police have confiscated 426 kilograms of narcotics on one of the roads of Bajestan County, the province’s police chief said on Sunday. 

Two smugglers were arrested and their cars seized during the operation, Second Brigadier General Mohammad Kazem Taqavi said, Mehr reported.

According to Taqavi, the seized narcotics shipment consisted of 388 kilograms of opium and 38 kilograms of hashish.

Khorasan-e Razavi’s anti-narcotics police have confiscated a total of 28,000 kilograms of different illicit drugs and dismantled 35 trafficking gangs between October 22, 2018 and October 22, 2019 in the province, he said.

Iran is at the forefront of the fight against drug trafficking. The drugs are mainly destined to lucrative markets in Europe and Persian Gulf Arab states.

The drugs originated from neighboring Afghanistan. 

John F. Sopko, U.S. special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction, said at the Wilson Center in Washington, DC, in November that the counternarcotics effort in Afghanistan "has just been a total failure",  the Business Insider said on December 5.

Opium cultivation covered 263,000 hectares in Afghanistan, according to the UN Office on Drugs and Crime. That was down from 328,000 hectares in 2017 but still more than any other year since 1994.

Also on Sunday, the commander of Sistan-Balouchestan Province border guards said his forces have disbanded a large gang of drug traffickers, seizing a remarkable amount of narcotics.

“The guards of the Mirjaveh border regiment, tipped off by the intelligence about a heavy consignment of narcotics loaded in several vehicles heading towards Iran to cross the border, embarked on reconnaissance operation in the region,” Second Brigadier General Mohammad Molashahi said.

“The guards, within the framework of several operational and logistic teams, found out the exact location from which the gang had planned to cross the border,” he added.

According to reports, in 2018 alone, Iranian forces carried out 1,557 operations against drug traffickers, seizing approximately 807 tons of different types of narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances.

MH/PA