Mehr News Agency, January 10, 2007

60% of Afghanistan's drugs transited through Iran

Afghanistan is the main source of drug production in the world

TEHRAN -- Prosecutor General Qorbanali Dorri-Najafabadi said here on Wednesday that 60 percent of the illicit drugs produced in Afghanistan are transited through Iran.

"Our country borders Afghanistan, which is the (main) source of drug production in the world," the Iranian Students News Agency quoted Dorri-Najafabadi as saying.

Afghanistan cultivated 130 thousand hectares of poppy last year and unfortunately it has topped 180 thousand hectares this year, adopting an important source of income for itself, he noted.

The general prosecutor criticized Afghanistan's officials and said, "Some time ago I had a meeting with a member of Afghanistan's judicial committee, in which he told me 'we can not do anything (about the drugs), you should avoid consuming them.'"

"No matter how much we increase the forces in the borders, we can not completely confront it," he said, adding that the best way to overcome the problem of drugs is through families, as small societies, to educate their members.

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