ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Temporary rehabilitation centers have been established in prisons and a facility is being built in Shaqlawa as part of the Kurdistan Regional Government’s (KRG) strategy to combat drugs, an official told Rudaw on Friday.
“Temporary rehabilitation centers for drug addicts have been established in prisons, so that they can be reintegrated into society and rehabilitated,” Salah Anwar, an advisor to the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs of the Kurdistan Region, told Rudaw’s Zana Kayani.
Work on the rehab centre in Shaqlawa is underway and staff are currently undergoing training, Anwar said, adding he expects operations to begin in the near future.
There are currently more than 5,700 prisoners in the Kurdistan Region’s jails, of whom 1,527 are charged with drug-related offences, which is one-fifth of the total detainees. More than 800 of them are dealers and traffickers, according to government figures.
Anwar said there is a high incidence of drug use among young people and blamed the problem on the availability of narcotics, emphasizing that all possible measures must be taken to prevent drug trafficking.
"Now the situation is under control and security forces at the border are preventing the infiltration of drugs into the territory of the Kurdistan Region," he said.
He said that drug use is higher among the unemployed and that the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs offered training programs and job opportunities as part of rehabilitation programs.
There are plans to open drug rehabilitation centers in every province of the Kurdistan Region, but implementation has been delayed due to the ”poor economic situation,” Anwar said.
A study published last July by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) reported that Iraq - including the Kurdistan Region - has recorded “a sharp increase in the trafficking and use of Captagon over the past five years.”
The report added that Captagon seizures in Iraq increased by almost 3,380 percent in Iraq from 2019 to 2023.
Combatting drug use and trafficking are priorities for the KRG and the federal Iraqi government.
