Abu Hilalain (“Father of Two Half-moons”) and Captain Courage are the names of a popular drug in the Middle East, Captagon. It is taken by students studying for exams, by young people dancing at parties, by truck drivers, by soldiers being sent into battle. The drug wave is quickly flooding the region.
Drug trafficking is a lucrative trade for Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and Tehran’s biggest allies, the Assad regime in Syria and Hezbollah in Lebanon. These forces have managed to span the production and distribution network of the Middle East and reach far beyond. Drug trafficking is inextricably linked to the widespread spread of Iranian political influence. At the same time, it generates billions of dollars in profits. The Shia theocracy and its proxies are in effect saying to the countries of the region, “Either you accept our political and economic terms or we will destroy your youth.”
Masters of Iran
The IRGC is Iran’s second special army, numbering about 120,000, where the most religious soldiers and officers are recruited. But the role of this organization is incomparably greater than that of the regular military. The IRGC is also a wide network of intelligence services operating inside and outside Iran, the Basij forces responsible for suppressing protests inside the country, and the elite Quds Force (Jerusalem), tasked with covert operations abroad. It is the Quds units, formerly led by the notorious General Qasem Soleimani, that oversee a network of Iranian proxies abroad, from Hezbollah in Lebanon to Iraqi Shia militias, or Hamas, funneling money and weapons to them.
The IRGC is also the largest economic force in Iran. According to various estimates, it owns, directly or through proxies and private entrepreneurs (family and friends of IRGC leaders), companies that contribute about half of Iran’s GDP. We are talking about the heavy and defense industries, telecommunications, oil exports, and media. And with the introduction of US sanctions against the country in 2018, the IRGC laid its hands on exports as well, so Iranian businesses are often forced to conduct their export-import transactions through the IRGC. Not for free, of course. It has gotten to the point where Iranian officials have no idea how much oil the country exports, as the IRGC oversees this area and the relevant data is classified. Needless to say, this situation creates unlimited opportunities for corruption and enrichment of both the IRGC in general and its leadership in particular.
In a sense, the IRGC is Iran, or rather it is the core of both the Iranian political system and the economy. Officially, all power in the country lies in the hands of the 84-year-old Supreme Leader, Grand Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The IRGC reports to him and carries out his orders. But in practice, it is the IRGC leaders who exercise real power, albeit with the permission of the Supreme Leader. Khamenei has effectively outsourced the country to this organization, allowing its leaders to enrich themselves uncontrollably in exchange for securing and preserving his power. As the joke goes in Iran, “men in boots suck power out of men in turbans.”
But the IRGC also enables the expansion of Iranian influence abroad. Drugs are an important part of this expansion.
Iran is the largest drug trafficker on the planet
The Iranian opposition website Iran News Wire has compiled an overview of the Iranian regime’s involvement in the distribution of narcotic substances based on reports by various governments and international press publications.
According to its authors, one of the dimensions of the IRGC’s crimes against the people of Iran and other Middle East countries is the IRGC’s role in drug trafficking and the spread of addiction in Iran. Iran is one of the most important drug-trafficking crossings in the world, and most of the drugs produced in Afghanistan are smuggled to European countries by the IRGC.
A report of the United Nations Office of Counter Narcotics shows that “about 40% of the drugs imported into Iran remain in this country, and the remaining 60% go to Iraq, Turkey, Azerbaijan and finally to Europe”. In a confidential report of the United Nations published by WikiLeaks and quoting the report of the American Embassy in Baku in May 2009, it was stated that “Iran’s government is considered the biggest drug trafficker in the world.”
The Times newspaper in an article on 17 November 2011 exposes the central role of the IRGC in drug trafficking: “Drug trafficking brings billions of dollars annually to the IRGC, who now have the monopoly of drug trafficking in Iran and is connected with criminal networks in the world.”
According to the United Nations assessment, 10 tons of narcotics are imported into Iran every day, most of which are distributed by the IRGC inside the country. In this regard, the words of Mohsen Rezaei, former commander of the IRGC, sound very ironic and ambiguous: “The border from which drug trafficking takes place is a certain border… this trafficking will not disappear and drug trafficking will be eradicated in the country only when the relationship between the power institution and drug traffickers is cut off.”
One of the Iranian drug trafficking biggest scandals was revealed in Germany in 1994, when it was found that the regime spent the income from the sale of drugs in Europe to buy and smuggle nuclear equipment, including uranium, to obtain an atomic bomb. German secret agents, undercover as drug buyers, came in contact with Iranian drug traffickers. One of the operators of this drug and radioactive substance smuggling network was the former deputy oil minister of the Khamenei regime, Habib Elahi.
Al-Sharqiya TV announced in 2008, citing the report of the International Narcotics Control Board, that “Iraq has become a heroin transit. The available information shows that the border between Iraq and Iran is the gateway to the entry of drugs into the Persian Gulf countries, Turkey and Bulgaria.” One of the advisors of the Iraqi Interior Minister declared: “Iran is the main source of sending drugs to Iraq.” (Al-Zaman International December 2008)
In 2010, Nigerian government officials announced that they had discovered 130 kilograms of heroin in a shipment that had entered the country from Iran. The security forces of Nigeria mentioned the names of Azim Aghajani and Seyed Ahmed Tahmasbi, and named the Quds Force, the elite branch of the IRGC, as responsible for drug smuggling to Nigeria.
In April 2017, the Italian authorities identified a network affiliated with the IRGC Quds Force, which is managing a number of drug trafficking networks to the European Union. Italian security sources revealed that “this network includes nine Iraqis affiliated with the Iraqi Hashd al-Shaabi militia led by a commander of the IRGC named Gholamreza Baghbani, who smuggled drugs through Iraq and Turkey to Italy and from there to Europe.”
On August 3, 2017, Reuters also quoted an Iranian government official as saying that “… the IRGC finances the Houthi militias by using drugs.”
In August 2020, Romania seized an enormous shipment of drugs smuggled into the country in a ship from the port of Latakia, Syria, which is under the control of the IRGC and its allies from the regime of the Syrian dictator Bashar Assad.
In December 2022, Jordanian customs authorities seized a metric ton of Captagon tablets smuggled inside date paste from Iraq. It was one of the largest drug seizures ever reported in Jordan.
The Captagon era
A new round of Iran’s drug trafficking, which is likely to even surpass the regime’s previous efforts, involves the production and distribution of the synthetic drug Captagon. But IRGC officers may be acting only as supervisors of this network, while the main producers are based outside Iran.
A recent documentary by Arab News investigates the sources of Captagon trade. Leading Captagon trade researcher Caroline Rose, Director of New Lines Institute, points out the immense role of the Assad regime in its manufacturing. The importance of this business for the regime and its loyal Syrian military is so great that Rose says she is doubtful Assad regime would relinquish its lucrative drug business income, despite apparent support and commitments to Arab countries during the Jeddah Arab League Summit.
Appearing on Frankly Speaking, Arab News’ talk show, Rose mentioned that not only does Captagon production in Syria provide the regime with “a large source of revenue,” but “it also upholds a very delicate system of power in patronage inside of regime-held areas that the Assad regime has relied on throughout the civil war.”
The Assad regime has survived only because of military and financial assistance from Iran and its allies. Iranian proxies have long been embedded in the Syrian army and pro-regime militias. The main force the government relies on is the Fourth Division, run by the dictator’s younger brother Maher al-Assad. This armed group collects tolls from private businesses by setting up roadblocks on the roads, robbing traders, seizing real estate and companies from their owners. Drugs are one of its financial pillars and one of the most important sources of revenue for the regime as a whole. At the same time, Maher is considered the main vehicle of Iranian influence in Syria.
On the prevalence of Captagon in the Middle East and its expanding global reach, Rose says the drug, which is sold at relatively low prices, has become extremely popular primarily due to its “variety of different uses”: it can suppress trauma, improve productivity, and induce a euphoric feeling. The drug is popular among different demographics in the Gulf, with some people using it recreationally, “but also amongst university students studying for exams to increase productivity. We have seen it across the region used by taxi drivers, by lorry drivers and truck drivers … as well as workers that are looking to work a second shift.”
“The biggest piece of information about Captagon that really should be better communicated to the public, particularly in destination markets like Saudi Arabia, is the fact that we do not know what is inside of Captagon pills anymore,” Rose says. She elaborates: “It used to be ethylene in the 1960s to the 1980s … but really since the early 2000s, we have seen a variety of different Captagon formulas pop up through one of the very few chemical analyses that have been conducted.” That is the main problem. “And because of this lack of uniformity, producers can make Captagon whatever they want it to be, and that causes and should spark serious, serious public health concerns.”
The Assad regime in Syria is the main exporter of Captagon
Jonathan Spyer, a leading Israeli expert on Iran’s policy in the Middle East and Iranian proxies, points out the ongoing economic crisis in Syria. Ninety percent of Syrians live below the poverty line. The steep decline of the Syrian pound is mirrored in current living standards. Supplies of electricity are patchy, and a recent decision by the regime to increase public sector salaries had the unfortunate side effect of precipitating a massive rise in inflation. The dire economic situation in Syria is also due to the continued effects of Western sanctions. The Arab normalization with Assad has also failed to yield economic dividends for the regime. Assad’s recent attendance at the Arab League summit in Jeddah has brought with it few promises of investment.
“The Arab states want the regime … to end the Captagon trade. … the drug trade is a vital source of income for his [Assad’s] family and his partners in the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) and Lebanese Hezbollah,” Spyer says.
Syria has become a narco-state that floods the Middle East with drugs, says The Economist.
The Economist journalists describe a party in the dunes north of Riyadh, the Saudi capital. Girls discard their abayas, the black shrouds that envelop them in public, and begin jiving to techno music with boys. A few swig from bottles, but most prefer Captagon pills, nowadays the Gulf’s favourite drug, at $25 a pop. They call it Abu Hilalain (Father of Two Half-moons), after the two letter “c”s embossed on the pills. Part of the amphetamine family, it can have a similar effect to Viagra—and conquers sleep. “With one pill,” says a raver, “we can dance all weekend.”
Though Saudi rulers have opposed the Assad regime for a long time, the pill-popping young people are funding it. For Assad, the drug has become a boon—at least in the short run. His country has become the world’s prime pusher of Captagon. As the formal economy collapses under the burden of war, sanctions and the predatory rule of the Assads, the drug has become Syria’s main export and source of hard currency.
The Centre for Operational Analysis and Research (COAR), a Cyprus-based consultancy, reckons that last year authorities elsewhere seized Syrian drugs with a street value of no less than $3.4bn. That compares with Syria’s largest legal export, olive oil, which is worth some $122m a year. The drug is financing the central government, says Ian Larson, who wrote a recent report on the subject for COAR.
Syria has long been involved in drugs, The Economist recalls. In the 1990s, when it ruled Lebanon, the Bekaa valley was the region’s main source of hashish. But mass production of drugs within Syria began only after the civil war erupted in 2011. Officers fed their men “Captain Courage”, as they called Captagon. Shia fighters from Afghanistan and Lebanon, who came to support the Syrian regime, brought their skills in making and trafficking drugs. Hizbullah, Lebanon’s biggest Shia militia, which has given crucial support to the Assad regime, acquired large tracts across the border in Syria’s Qalamoun mountains. They expanded hashish cultivation and developed a new cottage industry, making Captagon pills.
The role of Captagon in the economy of Lebanese Hezbollah
An important military ally of Assad, the Shia armed Hezbollah party, is also involved in the Captagon trade. It is Iran’s most militarily powerful partner, with tens of thousands of well-trained military personnel. Hezbollah currently controls Lebanon, without taking over the formal functions of governing the country. It also played an exceptional role in the Syrian civil war, securing tactical and operational successes for the Assad regime and Iran. However, there is more to Hezbollah’s role. It is also Assad’s Captagon distribution partner.
Hanin Ghaddar, who studies the activities of the Hezbollah, in her article published by the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, points out the organization’s involvement in drug trafficking. There is no doubt, Ghaddar argues, that Hezbollah is still financially stronger than other Lebanese parties, given its access to hard currency, smuggling operations, and drug trafficking. Despite all its economic troubles and Iran’s inability to fund the group on the same scale as it did before US sanctions were imposed in 2018, Hezbollah is still able to conduct large-scale military operations, maintain its own social services and mechanisms for recruiting new members.
“At this stage, Lebanon was seeking to manage a public debt of US$69 billion, totalling 150% of GDP,” Jonathan Spyer says. He points out that as the official economy foundered, the parallel Iran/Hezbollah shadow economy prospered. Not, however, in such a way that the average citizen benefited. The porous or Hezbollah-supervised borders between Lebanon and Syria allowed for smuggling of oil imports and their resale in Syria, to the benefit of Hezbollah. Captagon amphetamine pills, manufactured in Syria, and cannabis were smuggled the other way, finding their destination in European cities or in the Gulf via Hezbollah-supervised routes.
“Accept our terms, or we’ll destroy your youth”
The scale of Captagon trafficking is mind-boggling. For example, Italian police last year uncovered 84m pills worth over €1bn on a single ship. It was then said to be the world’s biggest interception of amphetamine-related drugs. In May the Malaysian authorities, acting on a Saudi tip-off, seized 95m pills. The Libyan port of Benghazi, linked by a regular shipping route to Syria, is said to be a key entrepot. Assad insists he is not involved. But because Assad finds it hard to pay his troops, he farms out much of his country to warlords who oversee the smuggling. The army’s Fourth Division, which is commanded by Maher al-Assad, the president’s younger brother, takes a big cut. Other relations run operations at the Mediterranean ports of Latakia and Tartous. A Lebanese drug-runner close to Hezbollah and wanted by Interpol boasts on Facebook of his ties to the Assads and senior Hezbollah clerics.
“It’s out of control,” says an insider in Damascus.
The regime may see Captagon as a lever in regional power struggles. It “uses drugs as a weapon against the Gulf”, says Malik al-Abdeh, a Syria watcher close to the opposition. “The message is: normalize relations, or we’ll destroy your youth.”
Captagon is where politics and economics are intertwined in a single knot. Saudi Arabia, according to Rose, is a “lucrative” market for Captagon-trafficking networks mainly due to wealth and demographic composition, including “a considerable population of youth with a lot of cash to spend.”
But Captagon has proved to be a double-edged sword. For the Syrians left behind, drugs may destroy the survivors of the devastating civil war. “Young men who haven’t been killed, exiled or jailed are addicts,” says a social worker in Sweida, a Druze-inhabited southern Syrian city held by Assad’s troops.
In a recent survey of Syrians in the north, 33% said they knew a drug user. That is up from 7% in 2019. Captagon has become part of local culture. Local television airs a series portraying a family of drug dealers.
An instrument of corruption
However, Iran’s drug trafficking network may have another role to play. In countries like Syria, Lebanon and Iraq, which have become Iran’s satellites, the centralized state has long ceased to exist, replaced by networks of Iranian-affiliated militias and political parties, some of which even have their own social services, like Lebanon’s Hezbollah. In the case of the Assad regime, it has itself become a collection of largely independent armed groups involved in racketeering and drug trafficking.
In a way, Iran has been cloning its own system in other countries. As government agencies weaken, power and influence shift to militias and related institutions, the deep state. In Iran, which has a parliament and a president alongside the IRGC, this deep state is referred to by the term “nezam”—the system. Its core, as mentioned above, is the IRGC, which itself once grew out of Islamist Shia militias. The more corrupt and decayed the centralized government institutions are, the greater the influence of the parallel state, which is also very corrupt.
Drugs are an important tool of Iranian infiltration into other countries. The greater their reach, the greater the involvement of officials and security officials in Tehran-related drug trafficking, the weaker the state. And the weaker it is, the stronger Iran’s influence on its individual representatives or even on entire units like the Fourth Division in Syria. Shia militias can be formed in parallel. A corrupt official, in exchange for services in organizing the production of Captagon, its distribution abroad, transit, or money laundering, may fulfill a particular order from the IRGC, from providing important information to helping open a “spiritual center” linked to Iran. The students of this center are future soldiers, commanders, and ideologues of the local Hezbollah.
Mikhail Shereshevsky, Middle East expert
Translated from Minval.az
