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TEHRAN (FNA)- Iranian Interior Minister Abdolreza Rahmani Fazli lashed out at the western countries for their biased stances on campaign against drug trafficking and their lack of cooperation with Iran in the same area.
"The western countries do not cooperate with Iran in areas of intelligence sharing on money-laundering and control of the flow of narcotics; their actions raises doubts about their resolve to fight drug trafficking," Rahmani Fazli told reporters after meeting representatives of Russia, Pakistan, Afghanistan and Tajikistan on anti-drug campaign in Tehran on Monday.
He, meantime, pointed to the seizure of illicit drugs in Iran, and said, "The drug combat squads of Iran's Law Enforcement troops have seized 479,219 kilograms of narcotics from the drug traffickers in the first nine months of 2015," Rahmani Fazli told reporters on Monday.
The Iranian interior minister reiterated that a sum of 2,284 drug gangs were also destroyed during the said period.
According to official estimates, Iran's battle against drugs cost the country around $1 billion annually. Strategies pursued by Tehran include digging canals, building barriers and installing barbed wire to seal the country's borders, specially in the East.
Iran has recently established a central database and strengthened police-judiciary cooperation in a new effort to combat organized crime.
Every year, Iran burns more than 60 tons of seized narcotics as a symbol of its determination to fight drugs.