ERBIL, Kurdistan Region of Iraq - Security forces in Erbil announced Thursday the dismantling of a drug trafficking network caught in possession of six kilograms of narcotics.

“As part of our ongoing efforts to combat narcotics, our anti-narcotics directorate… managed to arrest a network involved in trafficking marijuana in Erbil,” read a statement by the anti-narcotics directorate at the Erbil Asaiysh (security).

The statement detailed that the network consisted of five individuals who were in possession of “six kilograms of marijuana."

Describing the network as being “dangerous”, Erbil Asaiysh said the traffickers in question had “used women to manipulate children, the youth, and the wealthy to use drugs, and then sell them drugs."

The Kurdistan Region’s authorities have time and again expressed their commitment to combating the spread of narcotics in the Region.

The arrests come a month after Kurdistan Region’s anti-narcotics department announced the apprehension of more than a dozen drug traffickers who had over 80 kilograms of narcotics in a two-week-long campaign in Duhok and Zakho cities.

A delegation from the American Sterling Charity Foundation in June met with Erbil’s governor, Omed Khoshnaw, to discuss the prospect of opening of a rehabilitation center in the province.

Two more centers are also proposed to be built in Sulaimani and Duhok provinces.

Iraq, with its extensive borders with Syria, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait, has evolved from a transit route in the international narcotics trade to a significant drug consumption market.

Despite consecutive government cabinet pledges to fight the drug phenomenon in the country and Prime Minister Mohammed Shia’ al-Sudani having ordered the establishment of rehabilitation centers across all Iraqi provinces, the country’s infrastructure is still too weak to combat the rapid increase in drug use.

Iraqi authorities arrested around 14,500 suspects on drug-related charges in 2024 and issued death sentences for 144 suspected drug traffickers. At least 454 others were sentenced to perpetual imprisonment (20 years in Iraqi law), according to official data.