Iran’s Campaign Against Dope Trafficking

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32273, 16 April 1970, Page 25

Iran’s Campaign Against Dope Trafficking

(ly J

RALPH JOSEPH)

No tears are being shed for more than a score of dope smugglers who have so far been shot, since December last, under severe measures being taken by the Iranian government to I curb opium traffic into the country. About an equal number are facing trial under the new anti - narcotics law, which came into effect with repeated warnings that no mercy would henceforth be shown to traffickers. Police claim the recent executions are already proving an effective deterrent to smuggling. Introduced last summer the new law provides capital punishment for men caught transporting, possessing or concealing two kilograms (or more) of opium, or 10 grams ’of morphine, heroin or cocaine. (Women and the aged are not subject to execution, but may be gaoled for life).

Before enforcing the new law the government first released about 6000 opium smugglers and street pushers serving relatively mild gaol terms under the old-law. (The prisons were choked with them, police said). Then to show it meant business, it executed, before a firing squad, the first batch of 10 smugglers on December 14. The executions were given the widest publicity.

Those shot in the first j batch were somewhat desperate characters' who had been involved in a shoot-out with gendarmes on beingchallenged. On December 27,! however, one more smuggler: was executed after being I found guilty of possessing! only 10 grams of heroin. ! , The law was being applied! to the letter. The Police Chief, Lieutenant - General Mohsen Mobasser, said shortly after the executions: “They thought the government was joking.” Other smugglers have no doubt got the mes-i sage. Working In Groups | But if most have reacted by becoming more cautious,; some are apparently becoming more desperate, especially; on the Afghan border. As one gendarme officer pointed out, whereas previously the smugglers operated in small groups of perhaps three to five men, they were now com- 1 ing out in larger groups of 20 to 30. Between the end of Febru-: ary and the beginning of March three gun battles took place within two weeks between Afghan smugglers and Iranian gendarmes patrolling the border areas near Mashad. Thirteen smugglers and at least one gendarme officer were killed. In each case the smugglers were working in: large groups of up to 30 men. Tracked down by the gendarmes, usually on a tipoff; from local peasants, the smugglers put up stiff resistance, trying to break the cordon thrown around them. Those that did break out, after gun battles lasting sometimes for eight or nine hours, left behind with the dead and wounded large hauls of opium, guns and ammunition. The opium hauls, of up to 1,300 kilograms each, were enough to have sent the whole gang before the firing squad in each case. This probably explained the stiffening in their resistance.

Nine wounded Afghan smugglers arrested after one of these battles now face the death sentence, though so far no foreign nationals have been executed under the Iranian law. A German

inational, caught with a large ; quantity of opium in his suitcase while trying to get (through a customs checkpoint on the Iran-Afghan border, is also to face a military tri- ; bunal. . (Trial by military tribunals . for major crimes in Iran, ! incidently, is a carry - over from the time of Reza Shah, the present monarch’s father, when landlords were so powerful, ordinary courts in I the province dared not hand down judgments contrary to ! their wishes.) Smugglers Harried Apart from action against border desperadoes, a campaign is also being waged against organised smuggling. 'Previously, smugglers caught were usually just the carriers. The big operators and financers working behind the scenes usually got away. While the carriers were serving the (then) relatively mild gaol terms, the financers would look after the convicted men’s families.

Officials are now getting to the root of the problem. Police officers pose as buyers, arrest the pushers, and ask to | be led to the organisers. Those caught were formerly afraid to talk. Souealers were I being found dead shortly after they had talked. Now, with the possibility of death ;by a firing squad facing them anyway, they appear to be becoming more co-operative !with the police. It also gives the police a bargaining point for the smaller fish, but (whether they are using this to get information about the big fish in the ocean has not been disclosed. - Side by side with the action! against smugglers, a more !rational approach is being made to cure 250,000 known addicts in the country. It was jin fact alarm at the rapid rise in the number of addicts that prompted the government to take stricter antinarcotics measures. There were two million addicts in Iran in 1955, the year the country decided, on United Nations recommendations, to stop poppy cultivation. The number of addicts jat first dropped to 35,000 in 1962, but soared again to 250,000 by 1969. Addicts Treated Officials believed that largescale smuggling of drugs from neighbouring Turkey and Afghanistan, and the methods used by the pushers to make addicts of pliable people, were largely responsible for the rise in the number of addicts. Pushers would first get an unwary person, often a student, to try the drug a few times, and would then withold the drug when the craving for it came, until they had a new addict hooked. Students are said to :have been largely affected, ! and many died, especially from heroin addiction. Before 1955. addicts were mainly peasants who took to opium as a form of escape; from oppressive landlords. Under the new laws, addiction in itself is not a crime, but addicts are being treated ! at special centres. The method being used is that of ; gradually reducing the . amount of drug an addict , needs. Special ration cards have been distributed to . addicts, who are now able to ; purchase specified quantities Jof opium at authorised drugstores, at prices lower than those in the black market. To reduce the need to purchase opium from abroad, special areas have been set apart for poppy cultivation sunder official supervision. : The area allocated last year ; was 1730 hectares. It is to be

increased to 2000 hectares this year. This is of course far below the 19,000 hectares known to have been under poppy cultivation before the 1955 ban went into effect Iran also intends to export some high quality opium for medicinal use, when it has enough for its own consumption.