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Official: Iraq arrested more than 11,000 drug dealers, users in 2021

December 22, 2021 at 10:29 am

A view of 100,000 drug pills on August 01, 2021 [Mecid Al Othman/Anadolu Agency]

Iraqi authorities have arrested more than 11,000 people on charges of trafficking and using narcotics during 2021, a security official revealed yesterday.

Local media quoted the Director-General of Narcotics and Psychotropic Substances Control at the Ministry of Interior, Major General Mazen Al-Quraishi, as saying that the ministry arrested 11,207 people on drug-related charges, including 11,000 males and 156 females, from the beginning of the year to 17 December.

Al-Quraishi explained that the capital Baghdad recorded the highest number of arrests, with about 2,000 people, followed by Basra (1,871 persons) and then Babylon (1,617 persons).

According to the official, smuggling crystal meth and hashish are most common in southern provinces which are transported via Iran from Afghanistan, noting that Basra and Maysan are the provinces most used for drug trafficking. Drugs are then transported by sea to the Gulf states, he explained.

The Iraqi Commission for Human Rights recently reported that the authorities have convicted 2,033 people of 5,631 people arrested in 2020.

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