January 16, 2023
Baghdad / Obelisk: The intention of the Anti-Narcotics Directorate in the Ministry of Interior, in Iraq, to start examining all state employees to confirm their safety from drug use, reveals the spread of abuse among employees, penetrating state government institutions.
At the end of last year, the Ministry of Health submitted a proposal to examine all state employees to ensure that they are safe from drug abuse, while there is support for including the project as a legal text within the Anti-Narcotics Law No. 50.
Journalist Othman Al-Mukhtar talks on Twitter that the step of examining state employees to ensure that they do not use drugs is the most important step taken by the Sudanese government, referring to the news that 70% of crimes in Iraq are committed by drug addicts, many of whom are employees and members of the security services.
Journalist Mustafa Saadoun points out that drug abusers, including employees in state departments or night watchmen, reported that it helps them perform their jobs well and helps them stay awake for long periods, and then their psychological state becomes very bad.
Sources confirm that many government office holders have become drug dealers, after they spread widely in the country.
The large profits reaped by drug dealers tempt some employees to work in this trade, which has become the easiest way to get rich in Iraq, while features have begun to spread in government workplaces and the private sector.
In the past, drugs were spread, sold and distributed in the poor areas of Baghdad and other provinces, but today they are sold and distributed in the upscale areas of the capital, Baghdad, according to security sources.
The security forces arrested a female dentist, born in 1993, according to an arrest warrant in accordance with Article 32 of the Iraqi Drug Law, within the Zayouna area of the capital, Baghdad.
There is no official published statistics on the number of drug users in the country, but according to security officials, it is spread among young people of both sexes.
According to former member of the Iraqi Human Rights Commission, Ali al-Bayati, the numbers officially announced for the past year 2022 were represented in the arrest of 14,000 people among drug users and traffickers, including 500 women and juveniles, as trafficking gangs exploit them for the purpose of promotion and transportation.
Iraq used to impose the death penalty on drug users and dealers, but it enacted a new law in 2017 that included penalties for drug dealers, in addition to laws for treating addicts.
MP Ahmed Al-Juhaishi says that his bloc called for amending the anti-drug law to include examination of all employees and students by medical committees on an annual basis.
Edited by: Maysoon Baghdadi
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