Informal Drug Policy Dialogue 2014, Athens

The eleventh Informal Drug Policy Dialogue took place in Athens, co-organised by TNI and Diogene Association. About 35 policy makers, professionals in the field of drugs, academics and representatives from non-governmental organisationz participated in the dialogue. Participants from Czech Republic, United Kingdom, The Netherlands, Germany, Italy, Greece, Slovenia, Bulgaria, Hungary and the countries of  Northern, Central and Southern America, United Sates of America, Mexico, Bolivia, Ecuador and Argentina attended the meeting. The dailogue also included representatives from the European Monitoring Centre on Drugs and Drugs Addiction (EMCDDA), The Pompidou Group of the Council of Europe, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, the Drugs Policy Unit European Commission and the Office of United Nations AIDS.

This Informal Drug Policy Dialogue was funded by the European Commission and the Open Society Foundations. The programme incuded five sessions. The first session looked at an overview of the national Greek drug policy and the drug situation in Greece, developments in drug policy in Greece; the second session was dedicated to the current state of affairs in Vienna; preparations for the CND high-level review and negotiations of the joint Ministerial Statement; the third session discussed global cannabis policy developments; the control of New Psychoactive Substances (NPS) was subject of discussion in the fourth session; and finally, in the fifth session the road towards the upcoming UN General Assembly Special Session on Drugs (UNGASS on drugs) in 2016 has been discussed.

Executed with the financial assistance of the Drug Prevention and Information Programme (DPIP) of the European Union and the Open Society Foundations (OSF). The contents of this project are the sole responsibility of TNI and can under no circumstances be regarded as reflecting the position of the donors.