Iranian meth cartels are targeting Australia’s lucrative drug market, using Malaysia’s Port Klang as a key transit hub to smuggle their shipments, security experts have told This Week in Asia.
Per capita, Australians are among the world’s heaviest users of crystal methamphetamine – better known as crystal meth or “Ice”.
The drug’s high purity and addictive nature, combined with Australia’s remote geography and limited domestic supply, have made the country the world’s most lucrative meth market – and a magnet for international traffickers.
While local backyard meth labs supply part of the country’s insatiable demand, most of the drug is imported from Mexico and the “Golden Triangle” – a lawless border region spanning Laos, Thailand, Myanmar and China, which has long been notorious for narcotics production.
But the dominant cartels from these regions are now facing competition from a relative newcomer: the drug lords of the “Golden Crescent”, an arc that covers remote, dangerous lands of Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran.
This new trade is only beginning to reveal itself, with each drug bust at ports stretching from the Middle East to Malaysia and Australia exposing new connections in the supply chain.
Experts say it links a web of criminal actors – from Taliban affiliates and Iranian organised crime groups to Australian biker gangs and other syndicates that control distribution on the ground.
