In Japan’s underworld of organized crime, there is of course the infamous Yakuza, but there are also foreign nationals, including Iranians. For more than two decades now, they have been dealing drugs on behalf of the lower rungs of Japanese criminals. An Iranian with insider knowledge of these activities explains how this came about.

Pejman (not his real name) lived in Japan from the mid-80s to the late 90s. Today, he is in close touch with Iranian friends who still live there. All the details about the drug trade he shares in the following account were confirmed by a Japanese police source and a Japanese journalist interviewed by FRANCE 24 on condition of anonymity. 

"A wave of Iranian immigrants headed to Japan after the Iraq-Iran war (1980-1988), when jobs were hard to come by. At that time, Japan was looking for foreign workers to do tough jobs. This attracted many Iranians from the lower classes, quite a few of whom already had criminal records back home.

"However, it was really difficult to make it in Japan. What we found upon arrival is that nobody would hire us during our first three months, which was the length of our work visas. Only after the visas expired were we suddenly able to get hired. But because at that point we were there illegally, employers paid only about a fourth of the normal salary, and constantly threatened to hand us over to the police so that we wouldn’t protest.

"Small salaries coupled with the high cost of living in Japan lured many Iranians toward a life of crime. Of course, it helped that some already had experience in this domain, but most had come to Japan looking to make an honest living."