(AFP) - Police busted several prostitution rings sending young Iranian girls to France, Britain, Turkey and Arab countries of the Gulf  (Persian Gulf) and arrested more than 100 people, the daily Entekhab said Wednesday. The paper said the rings were based on 30 brothels in Tehran.

It was the first known report of an international network with Iranian and foreign members -- whose nationalities were not mentioned -- and links with European countries.

It was also the latest of a series of reports of crackdowns on prostitution, which is banned in Iran but has grown in line with the country's economic problems.

The paper said the elite Revolutionary Guards were led to the rackets after discovering a farm near Karaj, western Tehran, where great quantities of wine were being produced, also contrary to Iran's Islamic law.

The farm boss disclosed the existence of one prostitution ring exploiting school students and runaway girls picked up in Tehran's parks, the paper said.

The investigations discovered "three other big networks", one sending girls to the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Qatar, another to Turkey and Istanbul, and a third in which "40 Iranian and foreign businessmen" were involved in dispatching girls to Europe.

IRNA Monday said about 150 people, including 44 women, were arrested in Iran's holy Shiite Muslim city of Mashhad, in the biggest crackdown on vice since the 1979 Islamic revolution.