POLICE UP IN ARMS AGAINST DRUG-TRAFFICKING ALONG EASTERN BORDER

ZAHEDAN - Iran has launched a serious drug control campaign along the
eastern border with major drug-producer Afghanistan since the 1979-Islamic
Revolution, provincial head of drug control office said Wednesday.

Mehdi Morassaie told IRNA "the 1,200-kilometer joint border with
Afghanistan in Sistan Baluchistan has been the scene of a major
anti-narcotics fight."

He said over 900 billion dollars has been thus far spent on building
fortifications along the Iran-Afghanistan borders in a bid to prevent the
entry of the drug gangs into the Iranian territory.

The fortifications include earthenware embankments, barbed wire fences,
concrete barriers and outposts as well as watch towers used by the Iranian
police officers deployed along the border.

He said more than 3,125 police officers have been killed in the ug-related
fights throughout Iran since 1979, 1,393 of them lost their lives in Sistan
Baluchistan.

Since March 21 (marking turn of Iranian calendar year), Morassaie said, 14
Iranian cops have been killed in fight with drug smugglers.

He said some 28 million kilos of narcotics including opium, morphine,
hashish and heroin were seized from the drug smugglers last Iranian
calendar year which ended March 20.

Iran's top judge, Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi, on Tuesday promised
no mercy Tuesday for anybody sentenced for drug dealing or smuggling, as
another official called the country's drugs problem a national crisis.

"Drug traffickers and sellers must no longer benefit from any amnesty -- on
the contrary they must be severely repressed," he said.

Meanwhile, a police chief said, security forces and the police killed some
1,083 drug traffickers in the last Iranian year.

Mohammad Fallah said some 1,087 cases of kidnapping by armed bandits and
drug traffickers were reported and 227,000 people were arrested in
drug-related incidents during the period.

Iran is a major route for drugs originating from Afghanistan or Pakistan on
their way to markets in the Persian Gulf, Europe and beyond.

The Iranian government spent nearly $20 million last year in the fight
against drug trafficking, and has armed thousands of villagers along its
eastern border to help combat traffickers.