Int’l Cocaine Drug Ring Disbanded in Iran
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – Iran's anti-drug police squads have disbanded an international ring involved in cocaine-trafficking activities in the Iranian capital city after five-month long operation.
The members were identified in June 2013 after police arrested an African national for carrying 800 grams of cocaine in Imam Khomeini International Airport. Later the network's coordinator and one of the key members were arrested in an operation in Tehran during which another 800 gram of cocaine was seized.
The Iranian anti-narcotics police then established a special team to pursue the case and arrested a number of dealers inside the country.
The network was involved in the transfer of cocaine from Latin American to Iran.
Further work on the network's activities resulted in identification and the arrest a foreign national who were trying to transfer 17 kilograms of cocaine to Iran.
Iran is on a major transit route for drugs smuggled from Afghanistan to Europe, the Middle East and Africa, and the country's war on drug-traffickers has claimed the lives of nearly 4,000 Iranian police forces over the past 34 years.
According to the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, Iran is netting eight times more opium and three times more heroin than all other countries in the world combined.