The Terrible War of Addiction

CNN Research Section Reports:

Curses and damnation directed at others have befallen us…. Addiction is a scourge that devours society

Negative thoughts and constant curses against the sacred beliefs of others are not only unfounded judgments, but will also incur the wrath and displeasure of God. Look at what consequences this has brought to Iran so far: earthquakes, droughts, land degradation, water scarcity, moral and financial corruption, suicide, self-prostitution, child trafficking, hereditary diseases, unemployment…. and worst of all, addiction ………

Let us think about this a bit more:

Addiction involves both physical and psychological dependence. Some drugs may also create psychological dependence in patients, leading to increased consumption and addiction. An addicted person becomes intoxicated and satisfied upon receiving addictive substances, and experiences withdrawal symptoms and severe physical disorders when drug use stops. Addictive substances also cause the phenomenon of tolerance. Due to this phenomenon, an addicted person increases their consumption to achieve the original effect of these substances, which initially required smaller amounts. The severity and type of dependence on addictive substances varies depending on the type and effect of the substance. Some of these substances, such as opium and its derivatives, create severe dependence, while others, despite their effects on the mind and psyche, are not considered addictive.

The availability of narcotic substances is one of the most important factors in addiction, because when something is easily accessible to people, the tendency toward it becomes easier to develop. Experience in Iran has proven that allowing opium consumption for certain groups has led to its buying and selling, and has even contributed to youth addiction.

Traditional narcotics are gradually being replaced by cheaper industrial narcotics, and wealthy drug traffickers, in an inhumane move, are injecting and distributing the most dangerous types of these drugs into society in the form of cologne, pills, and food products. One of the narcotics that entered Iran in recent years is the BT drug, a product of India, which still dominates the black market. Its method of use and effects are similar to the narcotic substance “nas,” and it is sold in green packages with various fruit flavors. This narcotic substance causes addiction, stimulation and intoxication, dizziness, and the sensation of cold vapor leaving the brain, loss of mental and behavioral balance among its psychological side effects.

But what is the real issue:

The history of the Revolutionary Guards’ involvement in drug trafficking dates back to the Iran-Iraq War. The Iranian government, during the eight-year war, given the urgent need to secure financial resources for purchasing weapons and ammunition and keeping the war market active, used the immunity of diplomacy and the extensive land, sea, and air logistics capabilities at its disposal to engage in drug trafficking worldwide. Furthermore, after Iran’s defeat in the eight-year Iraq war and the adoption of an expensive nuclear weapons armament policy, the need for buying and selling these inhumane substances increased. Of course, given that the annual profit from the drug economy is 2,600 billion dollars, it became a lucrative source of interest to Iranian officials.

Statistics show that Afghanistan produces 74 percent of the world’s opium, and given that Iran is considered an important transit route for narcotics and a supplier to the world, the role of government organizations, including the Revolutionary Guards, in this trade cannot be denied. Nevertheless, the Iranian government has executed thousands of traffickers to distort world public opinion, and according to some activists, this government action only reveals one side of the coin. Security and intelligence investigations conducted in some countries have unveiled the direct and extensive role of the Quds Force branch of the Revolutionary Guards in this profitable trade.

The Revolutionary Guards in Iran, since the beginning of the Iran-Iraq War and by Khomeini’s ruling, engaged in drug trafficking to cover military expenses. This force used the cheap distribution of narcotic substances in Kurdistan as a tool against young people. With the expansion of the revolutionary war in Kurdistan, the Revolutionary Guards’ use of narcotic substances expanded. However, the main need for the Revolutionary Guards to engage in drug trafficking became evident during the Iran-Iraq War. After defeat in the war and the adoption of the Islamic Republic’s policy of arming itself with nuclear weapons, the Revolutionary Guards’ need to secure income from the preparation, production, and buying and selling of narcotic substances increased.

Consumption of 42 percent of the world’s opium!
A report prepared by the Office of Social Harms of the Ministry of Cooperation, Labor, and Social Welfare regarding the state of consumption and social effects of narcotic substances, part of which was made public in an interview of the office’s director-general with the Mehr News Agency, shows that Iran, more than being known as a transit country, has been a consumer country (at least in opium consumption).

According to statistics provided by the director-general of the Office of Social Harms of the Ministry of Cooperation, Labor, and Social Welfare, more than 450 tons of opium were consumed in Iran in 2013. This figure was more than 42 percent of total world opium consumption, making Iran the world’s largest consumer of this narcotic substance.

Given the extensive geographical borders of Iran with Afghanistan as the world’s largest opium producer, it is very difficult to intercept and control the physical flow of this illicit trade. However, as observed, alongside every real flow of goods and services, there is also a corresponding flow of money. As physical consignments of narcotics enter the consumer market, a monetary flow of equal value will exit that market.

A rough calculation of the financial flow of opium consumption in Iran shows that, calculating 1,000 dollars per kilogram of opium in Iran, the monetary outflow from Iran due to definite domestic opium consumption was more than 450 million dollars! To this figure must be added the costs related to transportation and transit fees. Certainly, the producers and exporters of narcotic substances, to facilitate money laundering, demand their receipts in hard international currencies.

In other words, the main smugglers of narcotic substances in countries like Iran are forced to convert financial resources into hard international currencies. At this juncture, the government and intelligence and judicial resources can, by monitoring information on currency buying and selling and its flow in Iran’s market, identify the key actors in this black trade. Given the high volume of currency needed by these merchants, identification would be very easy and would only require sincere intention and firm determination.

What has been said shows that the key to solving the drug trafficking problem is not at the eastern borders, but in transparent oversight of the performance of banks, financial institutions, and exchange offices within the country. The provision of currency resources for purchasing narcotic substances undoubtedly takes place in the country’s formal and informal currency markets.

Moreover, there is no doubt that money laundering of proceeds from this poisoned trade occurs within the country’s legitimate financial system, and proceeds from drug sales, after being mixed with clean money, are again converted into currency, and this profitable flow continues.

Given the passage of anti-money laundering laws in parliament and the digitalization of many financial transactions in the country, identifying this illicit flow would only require more careful oversight of (presumably) suspicious currency buyers and currency exchanges between domestic exchange offices and exchange offices in countries that serve as financial gateways to Afghanistan.

Furthermore, sensitivity and targeted oversight of the activities of small and large financial institutions in Iran would undoubtedly be helpful. This is where a big question mark arises: why, despite these possibilities, does Iran remain unrivaled as the world’s leading consumer of opium?

Michael Wood, a renowned British researcher and journalist, asks Professor Zheng Yang Wen about the paralytic consequences of the opium trade in China, which was controlled by the British Empire: Professor Zheng says: In 1830, the Chinese Empire asked Queen Victoria: Where is your conscience? … China decided and overnight set all of Britain’s opium warehouses on fire. Thus began the First Opium War, which had very damaging consequences.

Now there is no need for foreign diplomacy…. this terrible destruction in Iran has been created by our own hands

Source or lead:

The Mardom-Salari newspaper on July 1, 2014 wrote with a very small underestimation! that the financial turnover of narcotic substances in Iran is 10,000 billion tomans annually. The underestimation of the annual financial turnover of narcotic substances by this newspaper affiliated with the Rafsanjani-Rouhani faction, while the Iranian government news agency IRNA on September 13, 2013 in a report on the Congress on Drug Addiction, quoting a member of the Health and Treatment Commission of the regime’s parliament, wrote: “The addiction problem annually imposes 20 trillion tomans, which is roughly the entire health sector budget, as an economic cost on society, while 80 percent of addiction treatment is related to its psychological and social dimensions.”

Now it becomes clearer why at the beginning of this article the financial turnover of 10,000 billion tomans of narcotics annually in Iran was called an “underestimation,” and why it should be emphasized that the annual 20 trillion tomans in costs that the regime claims is imposed on the country as a result of addiction is only a small part of the horrific financial and human damages of the addiction catastrophe, for which the leaders of the clerical regime, as the primary perpetrators of the production, distribution, and trafficking of narcotic substances, are responsible.