Iran unrivaled in fight against illicit drugs: UN

Executive Director of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) Yuri Fedotov praised Iran’s achievements in the fight against illicit drugs, saying that the Western Asian country is peerless in this regard.

“No country is identical to Iran in terms of fighting against illicit drugs,” Fedotov told reporters on the sidelines of an international conference in Tehran on Monday attended by a number of regional countries’ ministers and heads of organizations responsible for the fight against narcotics.

“If we draw a comparison between Iran and other countries, it will only be based on the number of martyrs killed in the campaign against drugs,” he added.

He also emphasized that the UNODC is in talks with Iran over the efforts to strengthen border controls, adding that the organization has sent Iran’s list of required equipment to the UN headquarters in New York.

In recent decades, Iran has been hit by drug trafficking, mainly because of its 936- kilometer shared border with Afghanistan, which produces more than 90% of the world’s opium.

According to the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, the Islamic Republic is netting eight times more opium and three times more heroin than all other countries in the world combined.

The war on drug trade originating from Afghanistan has claimed the lives of nearly 3,700 Iranian police officers over the past 30 years.