VIDEO: Erbil security foils drug smuggling attempts near Iranian border

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – The Anti-Narcotics Directorate of the autonomous Kurdistan Region announced on Saturday that it had recently thwarted three attempts to smuggle illegal drugs, including one traveling from Iran who hid pills in his shoes.

In a statement received by Kurdistan 24, the directorate said that its units also managed to arrest three suspects in separate operations while they were attempting to bring drugs into the region, indicating that more than a kilogram of "crystal meth" was seized after being discovered, stashed in a type of tar wrap used for home insulation.

The statement added that the three defendants were arrested on Jan. 12 at the "Jundian" checkpoint located between the towns of Soran and Hajj Omran, along the border between the Kurdistan Region and Iran.

In one case, anti-drug forces arrested an Iranian man who had hidden 110 tablets of the narcotic tramadol in his shoes while on his way to the Kurdistan Region from his home country.

The sale and consumption of any narcotics or controlled medications are strictly forbidden in the Kurdistan Region and Iraq.

Kurdish and Iraqi authorities often intercept shipments of drugs passing through Iraq and the Kurdistan Region, mainly in the provinces of Basra, Diyala, Erbil, and Sulaimani.

Most of it is smuggled into the country through its porous border with Iran, on its way to Turkey, Syria, and ultimately Europe and North America.

Editing by John J. Catherine