TEHRAN (Iran News) – Eskandar Momeni, the secretary-general of Iran’s Drug Control Headquarters, heading a high-ranking delegation, has traveled to Vienna to attend the 63rd session of the United Nations Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND).

Eskandar Momeni, who left Tehran for Vienna on Sunday, is scheduled to address the CND meeting opening ceremony.

The CND confab will run from March 12 to 14.

Momeni will also hold separate meetings with senior UNODC officials as well as the heads of participating delegations.

The UNODC is the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime.

Simultaneously, Iran will also hold an exhibition of the country’s anti-narcotic measures at the venue of the UN in Vienna.

Iran, which has a 900-kilometer border with Afghanistan, has been used as the main conduit for smuggling Afghan drugs to narcotics kingpins across the world, especially Europe.

Despite high economic and human costs, the Islamic Republic has been actively fighting drug-trafficking over the past decades.

Iran has spent more than $700 million on sealing its borders and preventing the transit of narcotics destined for European, Arab and Central Asian countries.

The war on drugs has claimed the lives of nearly 4,000 Iranian police forces over the past four decades.

Just on Sunday, the police commander of the border province of Sistan-Balouchestan announced drug combat squads had confiscated 2,956 kilograms of different illicit drugs in Khash County. Second Brigadier General Mohammad Ghanbari said 1.492 tons of morphine, 1.442 tons of opium, and 22 kilograms crystal were seized from smugglers.

The Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND) was established by Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) resolution 9(I) in 1946, to assist the ECOSOC in supervising the application of the international drug control treaties. In 1991, the General Assembly (GA) expanded the mandate of the CND to enable it to function as the governing body of the UNODC.

ECOSOC resolution 1999/30 requested the CND to structure its agenda with two distinct segments: a normative segment for discharging treaty-based and normative functions; and an operational segment for exercising the role as the governing body of UNODC.

The CND meets annually when it considers and adopts a range of decisions and resolutions. The intercessional meetings of the CND are regularly convened to provide policy guidance to the UNODC. Towards the end of each year, the CND meets at a reconvened session to consider budgetary and administrative matters as the governing body of the United Nations drug program.