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Ammon News - Jordan on Monday launched several aerial raids into its northern neighbour Syria against hideouts of Iranian-backed drug smugglers in retaliation against a large-scale smuggling operation, regional intelligence sources said, according to Reuters.

The army said it foiled a plot on Monday by dozens of infiltrators from Syria linked to pro-Iranian militias, who crossed its border with rocket launchers, anti-personnel mines and explosives.

Two regional intelligence and a Western diplomatic source who track the situation in southern Syria confirmed that Jordanian war planes had hit the drug-related targets in rare raids inside Syria since the over a decade-old conflict began.

They said the jets bombed the suspected home of a leading drug dealer in the town of Salkhad in Sweida province while other strikes hit hideouts in the Deraa province.

The two provinces are in southern Syria along the Jordanian-Syrian border.

War-torn Syria has become the region's main site for a multi-billion-dollar drug trade, with Jordan being a key transit route to the oil-rich Gulf states for a Syrian-made amphetamine known as captagon, Western anti-narcotics officials and Washington say.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's government denies involvement in drug-making and smuggling. Iran says the allegations it was behind the drug trade are part of Western plots against the country.

Reuters