DRUG CARTELS IN MENA
THE MIDDLE EAST AND NORTH AFRICA’S ORGANIZED DRUG TRADE
TERRORISM REPORT | RESEARCH FEATURE
Question: Does the Middle East and North Africa have drug cartels comparable to those associated with Latin America?
THE SHORT ANSWER
Yes—but “cartel” is not always the most precise description. MENA contains sophisticated drug-trafficking networks, clan-based trafficking structures, criminal syndicates, cross-border smuggling organizations, militia-linked networks and, in documented cases, drug enterprises connected to state or armed actors. The evidence supports describing parts of the regional drug economy as cartel-like; it does not support treating every trafficking network as a cartel.
This distinction is more than semantics. A cartel, a criminal network, a clan-based trafficking system and a terrorist organization have different structures, incentives and vulnerabilities.
WHY THE LATIN AMERICAN COMPARISON CAN MISLEAD
The classic Latin American cartel model often evokes a large, centralized organization controlling production, transportation, territory and distribution. MENA’s drug markets can be more fragmented. Families, clans, brokers, smugglers, laboratories, border facilitators, political actors and armed groups can cooperate without belonging to one vertically integrated organization.
UNODC describes the broader Arab-region environment as one in which weak governance, porous borders and instability can be exploited by criminal networks involved in illicit trafficking, organized crime and, in some settings, terrorism. [1]
A TERRORISM REPORT DEFINITION
For this publication, “cartel-like” should be treated as an analytical category, not a universal legal designation.
- CONTROL — substantial control over production, transportation, distribution or markets.
- CAPITAL — significant and durable financial resources.
- ORGANIZATION — a continuing structure capable of coordinating multiple actors.
- TERRITORY — influence over territory, routes, border areas or markets.
- ENFORCEMENT — capacity to protect the enterprise through coercion, corruption or violence.
- INTERNATIONAL REACH — cross-border operations or durable international partnerships.
A network does not have to satisfy every factor to be important. The framework is designed to distinguish a temporary smuggling arrangement from a durable criminal enterprise.
CASE STUDY: SYRIA AND THE CAPTAGON ECONOMY
The strongest recent example of industrial-scale organized drug trafficking in MENA is the illicit Captagon market associated historically with Syria and Lebanon. UNODC reports that the Near and Middle East accounted for 77 percent of global Captagon seizures from 2020 through 2024, with production concentrated principally in Syria and, to a lesser extent, Lebanon. [2]
The market was capable of moving extraordinary quantities. UNODC reported individual seizures in late 2024 and early 2025 ranging from approximately 500,000 to 5 million tablets. The agency cautions that the origin of post-transition shipments is not always clear: they may have come from accumulated stockpiles, resumed production or relocated production. [2]
This uncertainty is analytically important. Seizure data demonstrate trafficking activity; they do not, by themselves, establish the precise location of production, the identity of every participant, or the final destination of the money.
SYRIA: PRODUCTION, POWER AND MONEY
U.S. Treasury has provided unusually specific evidence concerning the Syrian Captagon economy. In 2024, Treasury identified individuals and entities involved in illicit financial transfers and drug trafficking that supported the Assad regime. Treasury described Captagon and hashish trafficking as major sources of income for the Assad regime, Syrian armed forces and paramilitary forces. [3]
Treasury also identified a Syria-based company used to purchase a vessel that was later intercepted carrying more than $100 million worth of Captagon and hashish while traveling from Latakia toward eastern Libya. [3]
These findings demonstrate a documented relationship between drug trafficking and regime-linked revenue generation. They should not be generalized into a claim that all Syrian drug trafficking was controlled by one cartel.
LEBANON: TWO DRUG ECONOMIES
Lebanon illustrates why the word “cartel” requires care. Traditional cannabis and hashish trafficking in the Bekaa Valley has historically involved local clans, farmers and intermediaries. Carnegie research describes these networks as geographically rooted and clan-based. [4]
The Captagon economy introduced a different class of trafficker. Carnegie reports that Captagon networks developed broader cross-border relationships, including connections involving Lebanon, Syria, transnational traffickers and elements of political and security structures. [4]
U.S. Treasury has separately identified Lebanon-based traffickers with ties to Hizballah and the Syrian Fourth Division in connection with Captagon trafficking. Treasury described one designated trafficker as having helped move Captagon across the Lebanon-Syria border and channel proceeds toward regime-linked figures. [5]
These are specific government allegations and designations. Terrorism Report should identify them as such rather than converting them into an unsupported statement that Hizballah controls the entire Lebanese drug trade.
MOROCCO: THE CANNABIS MODEL
Morocco represents a different type of organized drug economy. UNODC identifies Morocco as a major source of cannabis resin, historically concentrated in the Rif, with hundreds of tons reaching primarily European markets each year. [6]
Current UNODC data show that cannabis-resin seizures remain concentrated in Western and Central Europe, North Africa and the Near and Middle East/South-West Asia. In 2024, reported seizures in North Africa—particularly Morocco—overtook those in Western and Central Europe. [7]
The International Narcotics Control Board reported that Morocco seized approximately 345 tons of cannabis resin in 2024, more than double the 169 tons reported in 2023, although still below the 2021 peak of more than 511 tons. [8]
Large production and trafficking volumes do not automatically establish the existence of a single Moroccan cartel. They establish a significant trafficking economy that warrants organization-level research.
CARTEL, SYNDICATE OR NETWORK?
Terrorism Report should use the following working distinctions:
- CARTEL — a comparatively centralized and durable organization exercising substantial control over multiple stages of the drug trade.
- SYNDICATE — a durable organized-crime structure that coordinates significant trafficking activity but may not control the full supply chain.
- NETWORK — multiple independent actors cooperating through relationships, contracts, family ties, corruption or temporary arrangements.
- CARTEL-LIKE NETWORK — a decentralized network that nonetheless possesses substantial capital, territorial influence, logistics and international reach.
THE TERRITORY QUESTION
MENA’s drug markets frequently operate in environments affected by civil conflict, weak institutions, porous borders, corruption and competing armed authorities. UNODC identifies these conditions as factors that criminal networks can exploit. [1]
But the existence of a weak border or militia-controlled area does not prove drug trafficking. Evidence must establish the relationship between the territory, the actors and the drug economy.
WHEN DOES ORGANIZED CRIME BECOME TERRORISM FINANCING?
This is the central Terrorism Report distinction.
- Drug trafficking is organized crime unless additional evidence establishes another relationship.
- A criminal organization paying an armed group for protection is not necessarily the same as a terrorist organization operating the drug business.
- An armed group taxing traffickers is a different relationship from directly trafficking drugs.
- A terrorist organization receiving proceeds from drug trafficking creates a terrorism-financing question.
- A documented financial transfer or material-support relationship is stronger evidence than geographic proximity or association.
FATF recognizes proceeds from criminal activity, including drug trafficking, as one potential source of terrorist financing for some extremist organizations. It also emphasizes that terrorist financing is a specific financial-crime problem requiring identification and disruption of the relevant funds and beneficiaries. [9]
EVIDENCE STANDARD
Terrorism Report should classify major claims using four evidence levels:
- DOCUMENTED — supported by primary government, court, sanctions, UN or comparable authoritative records.
- STRONGLY CORROBORATED — supported by multiple credible independent sources, but not fully established through a primary adjudication.
- REPORTED/ALLEGED — publicly reported or alleged by a government, investigator or credible source but not independently established.
- NO CONNECTION ESTABLISHED — research located no reliable evidence sufficient to establish the claimed relationship. This does not prove that no connection exists.
THE MENA DRUG-CARTEL MAP
A serious regional database should track at least Morocco, Algeria, Libya, Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Iraq, Yemen, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, while recognizing that MENA’s precise country definition varies by institution.
For each country, Terrorism Report should record the principal drugs, production areas, trafficking routes, organization type, known criminal actors, armed-group connections, financial mechanisms and evidence of terrorism financing.
THE BOTTOM LINE
MENA does have sophisticated drug-trafficking organizations. Some are sufficiently organized, wealthy, territorial and international to be described as cartel-like. Others are better understood as flexible networks or syndicates.
The evidence is strongest when Terrorism Report identifies the organization, identifies the drug, identifies the financial mechanism and documents the relationship. That is the difference between analysis and assumption.
The Latin American cartel model is useful as a comparison—but it should not become the template into which every MENA trafficking organization is forced.
RESEARCH NOTE
This article uses “cartel” as an analytical term rather than a legal classification. Government sanctions and allegations are identified as government findings; they are not presented as judicial determinations unless a court record establishes them.
SELECTED SOURCES AND CITATION ARCHITECTURE
[1] UNODC, Regional Framework for the Arab States 2023–2028. Regional framework addressing organized crime, illicit trafficking, terrorism, weak governance and porous borders. https://www.unodc.org/documents/AnnualReport/UNODC_REPORT_2024_MAY6_WEB.pdf
[2] UNODC, World Drug Report 2025 — Key Findings. Current evidence on Captagon seizures, Syria/Lebanon production, trafficking routes and post-2024 uncertainty. https://www.unodc.org/documents/data-and-analysis/WDR_2025/WDR25_B1_Key_findings.pdf
[3] U.S. Department of the Treasury, OFAC, March 26, 2024. Sanctions and factual allegations concerning Syrian drug trafficking, illicit finance, Captagon and hashish. https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy2210
[4] Carnegie Endowment, Double Dealers: Lebanon and the Risks of Captagon Trafficking, 2025. Research on Lebanese clan-based hashish networks and newer Captagon trafficking networks. https://carnegieendowment.org/research/2025/03/double-dealers-lebanon-and-the-risks-of-captagon-trafficking
[5] U.S. Department of the Treasury, OFAC, October 2023. Specific designations concerning Lebanon-based Captagon trafficking, Syrian Fourth Division links and Hizballah-related allegations. https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy2648
[6] UNODC, Morocco Country Profile. Background on Moroccan cannabis cultivation, trafficking and organized crime. https://www.unodc.org/pdf/egypt/country_profile_morocco.pdf
[7] UNODC, World Drug Report 2026 Data Portal — Cannabis Resin Seizures. Current regional cannabis-resin seizure trends and Morocco’s 2024 position. https://data.unodc.org/wdr2026?page=38
[8] INCB, Annual Report 2025. 2024 Moroccan cannabis-resin seizure figures and regional trafficking context. https://www.incb.org/incb/uploads/documents/Publications/AnnualReports/AR2025/Annual_Report/E_INCB_2025_1_eng.pdf
[9] FATF, Public Statement on Financing of ISIL, Al-Qaida and Affiliates. General evidence framework for criminal proceeds, including drug trafficking, as potential terrorist-financing sources. https://www.fatf-gafi.org/en/publications/Fatfgeneral/Statement-isil-al-qaeda.html