International Day for Humane Drug Policies

International Day for Humane Drug Policies
TNI Press Release, 26 June 2005

The United Nations has declared 26 June the International Day against Drug Abuse and Illicit Drug Trafficking. This year the UN slogan for this day is about healthy choices: "Value yourself... make healthy choices". Unfortunately, when drug control policies are concerned often quite unhealthy choices are made in the international arena, and more just and humane policies are undervalued constantly.

Harm Reduction and Needle Exchange

In March this year, at the 48th session of the UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND), the international community failed to provide clearer guidance to the UN Office on Dugs and Crime (UNODC) regarding its involvement in harm reduction. Prior to the CND session, the US government - the biggest UNODC donor - threatened to cut funding unless the UNODC would abstain from any involvement in or support for needle exchange programmes, despite conclusive scientific evidence that needle exchange is an effective public health intervention that reduces the transmission of HIV/AIDS and does not encourage the use of drugs.

The controversy triggered fierce tensions between UN agencies, the US, the EU and other reform minded countries. The issue will reappear on the agenda of the USEU transatlantic dialogue on drugs on Monday 27 June and at the UNAIDS board meeting on 27-29 June.

Although US pressure on the UNODC to withdraw support from needle exchange and other harm reduction approaches backfired, in terms of outcomes the CND session was most disappointing regarding the ambiguity surrounding the mandate for UNODC to collaborate in harm reduction efforts. Current UNODC policies remain in conflict with many statements made by other UN agencies and the declaration of the UN General Assembly Special Session in 2001 on HIV/AIDS that said that "harm reduction efforts related to drug use" and "expanded access to essential commodities, including [...] sterile injecting equipment" should be ensured by 2005 to stop the spread of HIV/AIDS.

More information: The United Nations and Harm Reduction

Opium bans in Afghanistan and Burma

When drug control at the production level is concerned unhealthy policies reign sovereign. Opium and coca growers in some of the most conflict-ridden and impoverished regions of the world are subject to drug control policies that only increase the misery and insecurity. In Afghanistan and Burma, the two largest opium producers in the world, local authorities under pressure from the international community are implementing bans on the cultivation of poppy. On the occasion of the International Day against Drug Abuse and Illicit Drug Trafficking, the United Wa State Army (UWSA), issued an opium ban in the areas under their control in northern Burma.

Banning opium has an immediate and profound impact on the livelihoods of 4.3 million people in both countries. Many more are indirectly dependent on income generated on the illicit market. The consequence will be a downward spiral of poverty in the opium growing regions of both countries. "The reversed sequencing of first forcing farmers out of poppy cultivation before ensuring other income opportunities is a grave mistake", warns Martin Jelsma of the Transnational Institute (TNI). "Aggressive drug control efforts against farmers and small-scale opium traders, and forced eradication operations in particular, will have a negative impact on prospects for peace and democracy in both countries".

More information: Opium Bans Will Cause Human Misery in Afghanistan and Burma, TNI Press Release 25 June 2005

Spraying of Drug Crops in Colombia

The Inter-American Drug Abuse Control Commission (CICAD), an agency affiliated with the Organisation of American States (OAS), recently joined the large number of existing scientific studies on the possible health and environmental effects of Round Up, the glyphosate formula being sprayed on illicit crops - coca and opium poppy - in Colombia. CICAD's investigation, under the direction of an international scientific team, concluded that the chemicals used in the spraying - glyphosate and Cosmo-Flux - do not affect human health or the environment, and that at most they could cause temporary skin and eye irritation, but serious doubts exist.

The National University of Colombia's Environmental Studies Institute published a critical analysis of the CICAD study, which considered technical aspects of the investigation, finding methodological shortcomings, as well as omissions and inconsistencies throughout the report. Those findings could point to a lack of impartiality in the CICAD study. By ignoring 8,000 complaints from people in the areas sprayed, the researchers demonstrated a lack of respect for the affected population. The study was carried out as if nothing had happened. Moreover, the new formula of the herbicide that is currently used is a well-kept secret for the outside world.

More information: The Politics of Glyphosate TNI Drug Policy Briefing 14, June 2005

New Opportunities in Peru

In June 2005, three regional governments of Peru are provoking intense political debate. In three parallel official decrees the governments of Cuzco, Ayacucho and Huanuco have declared the coca plant to be a "biological, historical and cultural patrimony of the region, and a botanical resource part of the cultural and medicinal tradition of the Andean region". These local initiatives challenge the status of the coca leaf in the UN drug conventions and offer a good opportunity for an open debate on the national drug control policies.

Later this month the book "Devil's talk" ("Hablan los diablos"), a compilation of writings of four Peruvian experts on coca and drug trafficking and interviews with coca peasant leaders, will be published, co-edited by TNI. The non-existence of public debate concerning national drug policy turned these experts into "devils" questioning conventional wisdoms on these issues. Their arguments and alternative policy recommendations could well be used to avoid further escalation and confrontations of conflicts between coca growing peasants and security forces in Peru.

More information: the book will be published by Abya Yala in Quito (Ecuador), contact: editorial@abyayala.org or phone + 593-2-25 06 251 or visit their website: www. abyayala.org.

International Day for Humane Drug Policies

Current international drug control strategies do more harm than good. TNI urges the international community to make healthy choices in order to prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS, and widespread misery and avoid a downward spiral in opium and coca growing regions. Instead of an International Day against Drug Abuse and Illicit Drug Trafficking it is time for an International Day for Humane Drug Policies.