JIROFT, Kerman Prov. -- Anti-drug police in the southeastern city of Jiroft have seized over 3.5 tons of illegal drugs from traffickers since the beginning of the current Iranian calendar year (started March 21, 2002), the provincial police said Saturday.

Ebrahim Shakeri told IRNA that the hauls consisted mainly of hashish, opium and heroin.

Iran has lost 3,300 of its security forces in a relentless anti-drug fight which has also left huge financial losses since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, the country's secretary of drug control headquarters, Ali Hashemi, said recently.

The campaign has further left 10,000 of Iran's security forces injured in the period under review, the official added.

Iran straddles major international transit routes of drugs from Afghanistan and Pakistan, better known as the "Golden Crescent," on their way to lucrative markets in Europe, the Persian Gulf and Central Asia.

The campaign has won plaudits from the international community, but the Islamic Republic has regularly complained that it needed more than conciliatory messages in a fight which it says it battles almost single-handedly.

The drug trade throughout the world registered a $1,500 billion turnover last year, the Iranian official said.

Despite global efforts to battle the scourge, drug production in neighboring Afghanistan is expected to surge this year.

According to unconfirmed reports, most of the regions under U.S. control in the war-devastated country are being devoted to poppy cultivation.