Drug Smuggling among Statesmen of Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi Era: the case study of Felix Aghayan

The growth of consuming and trading narcotics in Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi era had negative consequences including robbery, smuggling and other impacts of misusing the drugs. The policies adopted for increasing sale of opium annihilated the deterrence measures and paved the way for consuming them. Different political, court and military statesmen occupied in consuming and smuggling narcotics, and they gained huge profits in this regard. Some Pahlavi statesmen were partners with international mafia of narcotics in different parts of the world. One of these statesmen was Felix Aghayan who was regarded as an international smuggler. In this article, done by descriptive-analytical method, we try to examine the role of influent people like Felix Aghayan in promoting the phenomenon of drug smuggling in Mohammad Reza Shah era and prove that Pahlavi regime statesmen occupied in consuming or smuggling narcotics as a profitable business.