ERBIL, Kurdistan Region of Iraq – Since mid-2023, rehabilitation centers across Iraq have treated and reintegrated approximately 5,900 drug addicts into society, Interior Ministry spokesperson Abbas al-Bahadli said Friday.

The abusers were treated across Iraq’s 16 rehabilitation centers, each featuring around 5,000 beds, Bahadli told Iraq’s state-owned INA outlet, six of which are in Baghdad, Karkh, and Rusafa, while 10 others are located in the rest of the Iraqi provinces.

“The number of those who have been rehabilitated from a health, physical, and psychological perspective and reintegrated into society as healthy, normal citizens has reached approximately 5,900 people across all provinces,” Bahadli revealed.

The centers began receiving drug abusers in mid-2023, according to the ministry spokesperson, who added that prior to 2023, there were no rehabilitation centers under the Iraqi interior ministry. Before the opening of Iraq’s rehabilitation centers, the users were put in one prison with drug traffickers, Bahadli noted, a move he dubbed a “major mistake,” as it led to users forming the necessary connections to become dealers after serving their sentences.

Iraq, with its extensive borders with Syria, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait, has evolved from a transit route to a significant consumption market. Authorities in both the Kurdistan Region and Iraq, however, have redoubled their efforts to root out the problem, with initiatives aiming to provide users with necessary assistance, as well as frequent operations to apprehend traffickers.

The University of Duhok’s Vice President Dilshad Hakim told The New Region on Wednesday that the university had “opened a center for treating substance abuse addicts” and helped raise awareness on the matter among the public.

Erbil Governor Omed Khoshnaw, meanwhile, held a meeting in late June with a delegation from the American Sterling Charity Foundation to discuss the opening of a rehabilitation center in the city, where he pledged "full coordination and assistance from the governorate to the delegation for establishing” the center.

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 life (20 years in Iraqi law), according to official data.

In the first three months of 2025 alone, authorities across Iraq detained at least 1,365 suspected drug traffickers of Iraqi nationality and 194 foreign nationals, according to data published by the General Directorate of Narcotics and Psychotropic Substances in late March.