Iran, Russia sign MoU on drug fighting

Iran and Russia have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to increase their cooperation in fighting drug production and trafficking.

The MoU was signed by Iran’s Interior Minister Mostafa Mohammad-Najjar and Russian Federal Drug Control Service chief Viktor Ivanov in Tehran on Sunday.

“Forming a joint work group for coordinating operational and investigational measures in Iran and Russia, attempting to stop narcotics production in Afghanistan and destroying heroin production laboratories there, and cracking down on drug trafficking gangs in the region are some of the items included in this MoU,” Mohammad-Najjar said.

Mohammad-Najjar said Iran has paid a heavy cost for fighting drug trafficking, adding that 3,700 members of the country’s anti-drug forces have been martyred and 11,000 have been injured to date.

Afghanistan continues to account for 90 percent of the world’s illicit opium and heroin production, the UN drugs monitoring body said in its 2010 report.

The poppy production and drug business in Afghanistan has come at a heavy cost for neighboring Iran. With a 900-kilometer (560-mile) common border with Afghanistan, Iran has been used as the main conduit for smuggling Afghan drugs to drug dealers in Europe.

“Cooperation between Iran and Russia is constructive and according to the 2005 agreement,” IRINN quoted Ivanov as saying.

This is while the level of international cooperation on fighting drug trafficking is very low, Ivanov said. He added that 10 years have passed since the occupation Afghanistan began but instead of diminishing, drug production has flourished in this country.

Ivanov said Iran and Russia feel threatened because of the drugs produced in Afghanistan.

In 2001, the US and its allies invaded Afghanistan under the pretext of wiping out terrorism. However, the US-led occupation of the country has now turned into a long war of attrition.

Since the start of the 2001 US-led invasion of Afghanistan, more than 34,000 Afghan civilians have been killed in the country as a result of the war.