El principio de la proporcionalidad es un elemento clave del derecho internacional y se debería aplicar en todos los casos, incluidos los de delitos de drogas.
Proportionality is one of the key principles of the rule of law aiming to protect people from cruel or inhumane treatment. The principle has been established in international and regional human rights agreements and many countries have adopted reflections of it in their constitution or penal code. Its application to drug-related offences is firstly the responsibility of the legislators, in defining the level of penalisation of certain behaviours.
Across the world, citizens and social movements are mounting strong and effective campaigns to fight the environmental and social abuses of transnational corporations.
Este número especial de “América Latina en Movimiento” de ALAI muestra el funcionamiento del capital transnacional, los sectores en los que actúa, su lógica globalizada, la estructura de su promiscua relación con los poderes públicos a todos los niveles, la magnitud de los abusos y su irresponsabilidad social, económica y ambiental.
It’s time for fair prices for farmers and shoppers It’s time to take our environment seriously It’s time for food sovereignty It’s time to deliver good food and good farming everywhere
The fiscal treaty was voted on in a referendum in Ireland on 31st May and was approved by a margin of 60% to 40% (with a turnout of barely 50% of eligible voters). To understand the significance of the treaty and the referendum result, it is necessary to understand the origins of the Irish and European debt crises.
On 19 June, 2012, the Ganjazz Art Club in Donostia, one of the oldest Cannabis Social Clubs in Spain, received a visit that was unimaginable a few years earlier: a group of members of the autonomous regional Basque parliament on official business. Its goal was to find out how one of these cannabis users’ associations, that have proliferated over the past few years, operates.
Call to International Action for the economic, political, cultural and environmental sovereignty of our peoples. End the impunity of transnational corporations Now!
Despite elections, Greece is heading for an exit from the euro, and the rest of the eurozone periphery may follow, precipitating a huge change in the EU. After the crisis, Greece could slowly recover.
Millions of dollars in international aid for drug enforcement is spent in countries with extremely poor human rights records and with little or no accountability for the resulting abuses, according to a this investigative report carried out by the UK-based drugs and human rights organisation, Harm Reduction International. The report tracks drug enforcement funding from donor states, often via the United Nations, to countries where executions, arbitrary detention, physical abuse and slave labour are weapons in the war on drugs.
As the debate on drug policy and law reform gathers momentum on the international stage, the failings of the three UN drug control conventions (1961, 1971 and 1988) have come into stark relief. Criticisms of the global drug control regime established by the drug treaties have now entered the mainstream public discourse and political debate. The discussions around treaty reform that would allow or facilitate a wider spectrum of approaches to drugs are assuming a degree of urgency.
Remarkable drug policy developments are taking place in Latin America. This is not only at the level of political debate, but is also reflected in actual legislative changes in a number of countries. All in all there is an undeniable regional trend of moving away from the ‘war on drugs’. This briefing explains the background to the opening of the drug policy debate in the region, summarises the most relevant aspects of the ongoing drug law reforms in some countries, and makes a series of recommendations that could help to move the debate forward in a productive manner.
El debate político sobre las drogas en América Latina está dando pasos notorios. Los cambios legislativos que están introduciendo varios de los países de la región revelan también una tendencia innegable a alejarse de la “guerra contra las drogas”. Este informe explica los antecedentes de la apertura del debate sobre las políticas de drogas en la región, resume los aspectos más relevantes de las reformas a las leyes de drogas que actualmente cursan en algunos países y propone una serie de recomendaciones de políticas que podrían ayudar a avanzar el debate de manera productiva.
This study brings together available evidence to provide a comprehensive analysis of cannabis production and markets across the EU. It combines information from EMCDDA routine reporting — data on patterns of prevalence and use, seizures, police reports, drug-law offences, cannabis potency and retail market prices — with literature on cannabis markets to create an in-depth analysis of the issue in a European context.
The global war on drugs is driving the HIV pandemic among people who use drugs and their sexual partners. Throughout the world, research has consistently shown that repressive drug law enforcement practices force drug users away from public health services and into hidden environments where HIV risk becomes markedly elevated. Mass incarceration of nonviolent drug offenders also plays a major role in spreading the pandemic. Today, there are an estimated 33 million people worldwide living with HIV – and injection drug use accounts for one-third of new HIV infections outside of sub-Saharan Africa.
The Alternative World Drug Report, launched to coincide with publication of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime’s 2012 World Drug Report, exposes the failure of governments and the UN to assess the extraordinary costs of pursuing a global war on drugs, and calls for UN member states to meaningfully count these costs and explore all the alternatives.
La guerra global a las drogas está impulsando la pandemia del VIH entre las personas que usan drogas y sus parejas sexuales. En todo el mundo, la investigación científica ha demostrado consistentemente que las prácticas represivas de aplicación de ley de drogas distancian a los usuarios de drogas de los servicios de salud pública y los obliga a permanecer en entornos ocultos donde el riesgo del VIH se eleva notablemente. El encarcelamiento masivo de infractores no violentos a la ley de drogas también juega un papel importante en la diseminación de la pandemia. Hoy en día, se estima que 33 millones de personas en todo el mundo viven con el VIH, y las personas que se inyectan drogas representan aproximadamente la tercera parte de las nuevas infecciones de VIH que se producen fuera del África subsahariana.
El debate político sobre las drogas en América Latina está dando pasos notorios. Los cambios legislativos que están introduciendo varios de los países de la región revelan también una tendencia innegable a alejarse de la “guerra contra las drogas”. Este informe explica los antecedentes de la apertura del debate sobre las políticas de drogas en la región, resume los aspectos más relevantes de las reformas a las leyes de drogas que actualmente cursan en algunos países y propone una serie de recomendaciones de políticas que podrían ayudar a avanzar el debate de manera productiva.
