Iranian police kill 10 drug runners - IRNA

TEHRAN, Mar 19 (Reuters) Iranian police have killed 10 armed drug runners on the border with Afghanistan, a senior police officer today said.

''Police officials at the border area of Chahsorkh in Tayyebat killed 10 armed bandits,'' Iskandar Momeni, a police commander in the area near the northeastern city of Mashhad, told the official IRNA news agency.

He said a sweep of the area after the killings, which took place on Saturday, uncovered several Kalashnikov rifles and ''a large amount of drugs''.

Iran is one of the world's key narcotics thoroughfares, carrying drugs to Europe from Afghanistan, which produces 85 percent of the world's opium.

More than 3,300 Iranian troops have died in gun battles with bandits and traffickers since the 1979 Islamic revolution. The country's borders with Pakistan and Afghanistan resemble a war zone, dotted with forts, trenches and ramparts.

REUTERS SY RN2252