TEHRAN: Iran’s Customs Office inaugurated a center for training drug-sniffing dogs in a bid to help prevent the smuggling of illicit drugs into the country.
The detector dog training center was inaugurated in a ceremony attended by Secretary-General of the World Customs Organization Kunio Mikuriya and the head of Iran’s Customs Office.
Since the beginning of the current Iranian year (which started on March 20), the Iranian Customs Office has managed to detect more than 40 tons of illicit drugs. Detection or sniffer dogs are trained by police to detect substances such as explosives, illegal drugs or blood.
Iran, which has a 900-kilometer common border with Afghanistan, has been used as the main conduit for smuggling Afghan drugs to narcotics kingpins in Europe. Despite high economic and human costs, the Islamic Republic has been actively fighting drug trafficking over the past three decades.
The country has spent more than $700 million on sealing its borders and preventing the transit of narcotics destined for European, Arab and Central Asian countries. The war on drug trade originating from Afghanistan has claimed the lives of nearly 4,000 Iranian police officers over the past decades.
