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Vienna, Dec 14, IRNA – Iranian Interior Minister Abdulreza Rahmani Fazli in a meeting with the Executive Director of United Nation Office for Drugs and Crime (UNODC) Yury Fedotov on Monday signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) on the fight against narcotic drugs.
The MoU aims to provide Iran with dlrs. 20 million for implementation of a five year program, said the report.
Speaking to reporters, he said this is the fourth document signed by the Islamic Republic of Iran and UNODC.
In the past three documents, due to allocation of insufficient fund, the program failed to attain its goals, Fazli said.
Iran has remained committed to its previous documents, underlined the minister.
In the new program the UNODC has pledged to provide Iran with the sum of dlrs. 20 million for the fight against narcotic drugs and the country is to implement the program in cooperation with UNODC, he said.
Iran spends huge sum of money on anti-drug fight and medical treatment as well as prevention of drug addiction but the amount of money provided by the United Nations for this program is very low, Fazli said.
Huge sum of money obtained through drug trafficking is depositd in European banks through money laundering, he said adding that the European countries are experienced enough in the field but are unwilling to cooperate with Iran, said the Iranian minister.
Economic sanctions against Iran is a good excuse for some countries to avoid cooperating with Iran in the anti-drug fight program, he said.
Unfortunately, the other side failed to do its utmost in broadening cooperation with Iran, he said.
Fazli arrived in Vienna on Monday to attend the anti-narcotics meeting attended by high-ranking officials of Afghanistan's neighboring countries.
Rahmani Fazli is also scheduled to deliver a speech at the Paris Pact ministerial meeting to be attended by senior officials from different world countries at the UN in Vienna.
The Iranian interior minister will also meet his Austrian counterpart to discuss boosting cooperation on fighting drug trafficking.
Paris Pact has about 60 member-states and it has been established to fight drug trafficking in Afghanistan.
The first meeting of the ministers of Paris Pact was held in Paris in 2003 with the aim of fighting drug trafficking.