This panel discussion on "The road to the United Nations General Assembly’s special session on the World Drug Problem 2016 (UNGASS 2016)" was organised by the United Nations University (UNU).

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The road to the United Nations General Assembly’s special session on the World Drug Problem 2016 (UNGASS 2016)

A national consultation was held in New Delhi today to discuss the emerging challenges faced by India’s drug-using communities. Harsh laws, policies and practices that punish drug users only perpetuate the harms of drug use, and there is increasing evidence that India’s drug laws stifle the country's HIV response.

Organised by India HIV/AIDS Alliance (Alliance India) in collaboration with United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), the consultation saw more than 100 stakeholders from government, affected drug-using communities, media, international agencies, and civil society come together to discuss the emerging challenges faced by India’s drug-using communities and synergies to address this crisis of health and rights.

Worldwide 16 million people are estimated to inject drugs, and three million of them are living with HIV. In India, HIV prevalence in this group is 24-times that of the general population. Though progress has been made, the HIV epidemic continues to be fueled by the stigma and discrimination often experienced by drug users. In India, the lack of access to services can effectively be a death sentence for people who inject drugs. While some parts of the country, especially the Northeast, have developed a range of services for this vulnerable population, most other states have few if any such services. Even in places where basic services exist, it remains difficult for beneficiaries to access them.

The simple reality is that drug users are dying due to lack of attention to a variety of their health problems, including Hepatitis C, HIV, overdose, and detoxification. Some of these services remain controversial and currently not part of India’s basic harm reduction service package, while others are often not available where needed.

Harsh drug laws undermine India's HIV response

Every deputy in the Health Committee of Congress in Chile agreed to move forward in the discussion for allowing cannabis use and self-cultivation. The initiative comes from the legislature, according to the urgent need to avoid criminalising people who require cannabis or its derivates for treatment of diseases that cause pain and reduce trafficking in more deprived areas, since the government still does not respond to these situations.

All political sectors are open to allowing the medical use of cannabis, although differences persist on the recreational use of the plant - this will be further discussed in Congress.

Currently the law 20.000, which regulates the use of narcotics and psychotropic substances, allows personal consumption, and accepts their therapeutic application, but criminalises all access to these compounds, criminalising consumers with the same sentences as for drug dealers. Although the government has allowed the import of drugs which compounds are derived from cannabis, the protocol is a cumbersome and very costly preparation, so it continues to be difficult to access to them.

Keep up-to-date with drug policy developments by subscribing to the IDPC Monthly Alert.

Unanimous support from deputies to legislate marijuana use and self-cultivation in Chile

Pakistan, a country already tormented by regional insurgencies, is fighting a losing battle against a different kind of foe: drug addiction. In the country’s northwestern province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK), an estimated 11 percent of residents use illicit substances – primarily heroin. Peshwar, the provincial capital of KPK, is a city rife with homeless addicts and dirty needles.

“Pakistan’s illegal drug trade is believed to generate $2 billion a year [making] Pakistan the most heroin-addicted country, per capita, in the world,” wrote David Browne, who covered the mujahideen insurgency in the 1980s, in a recent exposé for 

. “Peshawar is at the center of this phenomenon, in close proximity to extensive opium-poppy fields in the Afghan provinces of Badakhshan, Kunar and Nangarhar, and the rudimentary heroin-processing labs clustered around Landi Kotal in the adjoining Khyber tribal agency.”

The booming drug trade, which goes hand-in-hand with local Islamist groups, has transformed Peshwar from a city popular with tourists for its outdoor bazaars to a violence-ridden wasteland. Public offices are hidden behind extensive barricades and blast walls to protect from suicide bombers. Travelers have been replaced by derelicts, constantly in search of their next hit.

According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) in a report titled “Drug Use in Pakistan 2013,” 6.7 million Pakistanis used drugs last year. A staggering 4.25 million are thought to be drug dependent. Drug rehabilitation programs and other treatments were provided for only 30,000 of the country’s addicts in 2013.

 The rising prevalence of injecting drug users in Pakistan could create an HIV/AIDS crisis

The death of 19-year-old Georgina Bartter at a music festival on the weekend from a suspected ecstasy overdose could possibly have been avoided with a simple harm-minimisation intervention. Pill testing, or drug checking as it’s known in Europe, provides feedback to users on the content of illegal drugs, allowing them to make informed choices.

Taking illicit drugs, especially ecstasy, is not particularly unusual for someone of Bartter’s age. A 2010 survey found more than 11% of 20- to 29-year-olds and 7% of 18- to 19-year-olds had taken the drug in the previous 12 months. According to annual research among 1,000 ecstasy users, 70% of these pills are taken at clubs, festivals and dance parties.

Australia is internationally applauded for our harm-minimisation approach to drugs but we have failed to introduce pill testing, even though it is an intuitively appealing strategy.

Pill-testing kits or booths at venues where pills are known to be consumed could inform users about the content of illicit drugs. As we have equipment that can test drugs in real time, people intending to take them could have them checked beforehand.

Research shows young people are highly supportive of pill testing; more than 82% of the 2,300 young Australians aged between 16 and 25 years surveyed for the Australian National Council on Drugs in 2013 supported its introduction. The finding is consistent with young people’s overall views about drugs: they want better information in order to make informed choices.

Six reasons Australia should pilot ‘pill testing’ party drugs

A joint contribution by: Professor Dave Bewley-Taylor, Martin Jelsma and Damon Barrett

State-level cannabis reforms, which gathered steam this month, have exposed the inability of the United States to abide by the terms of the legal bedrock of the global drug control system; the 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs. This is something that should force a much-needed conversation about reform to long-standing international agreements. But while ostensibly 'welcoming' the international drug policy reform debate, it is a conversation the US federal government actually wishes to avoid. The result is a new official position on the UN drugs treaties that, despite its seductively progressive tone, serves only to sustain the status quo and may cause damage beyond drug policy.

The 1961 Single Convention has been massively influential. Almost every state in the world is bound to prohibit cultivation, trade and possession of cannabis and a range of other substances such as coca and opium for anything but medical and scientific purposes. Wherever you are, your drugs laws are probably modeled on this agreement.

The United States has been a staunch defender of this legal regime. The treaties are central to its foreign policy on drugs, including in Latin America. But at home the government has been clear that it will not trample on the will of voters with regard to cannabis, even though this places it in breach of the 1961 Convention. So the US faces a predicament; a treaty breach it does not wish to admit within a system it wishes to protect.

Fatal attraction: Brownfield's flexibility doctrine and global drug policy reform

The arbitrary and excessive use of pretrial detention is a massive and widely ignored pattern of human rights abuse that affects—by a conservative estimate—15 million people a year. The right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty is universal, but at this moment some 3.3 million people are behind bars waiting for a trial that may be months or even years away. No right is so broadly accepted in theory but so commonly violated in practice. The global overuse of pretrial detention is among the most overlooked human rights crises of our time.

Presumption of guilt: The global overuse of pretrial detention

绿色党的总统候选人彼得Sinkamba承诺其选民通过种植和出口大麻来削减国家对矿业的依赖。英语版本拥有更多信息，请阅读下文。

随时掌握与药物政策发展相关的最新信息。

Peter Sinkamba on campaign trail in Chingola city, part of Zambia’s copperbelt.Photograph: Courtesy of The Independent Observer

For decades, Zambia has staked its economic fortunes on copper mining. But when voters in this southern African nation go to the polls in January to select a new president, at least one candidate will be looking to send that tradition up in smoke.

On Friday, Peter Sinkamba will announce his candidacy on the Green party ticket to replace the late President Michael Sata, who died on 29 October from an undisclosed illness. Sinkamba, regarded as Zambia’s leading environmentalist for his battles against the country’s big copper mines, is running on an unlikely platform, especially in this socially conservative nation: legalising marijuana.

His plan, first announced in April, calls for cannabis’ legalisation for medicinal use in Zambia, which would be a first in Africa. The surplus crop would be exported abroad, earning Zambia what Sinkamba claims could be billions of dollars.

At stake is an opportunity to diversify Zambia’s economy while beginning to clean up the environmental degradation left by close to a century of intensive opencast mining.

Copper has long been Zambia’s national treasure, having fired the country to middle-income status in the 1960s and 70s. But by the late 1990s, tumbling copper prices sent the country’s mining income to its lowest levels since independence from the UK in 1964.

Mining has since rebounded. In 2012, copper exports amounted to $6.3bn (£4bn), or nearly 70% of Zambia’s total export market. But many Zambians now find their country’s dependency on copper stifling. Local communities suffer from environmental impacts like toxic sulphur dioxide emissions from refineries.

赞比亚能通过大麻来挽救环境吗？

这个问卷旨在美洲范围内编制法律信息，服务获取，部门间协调和患艾滋病的妇女人权的信息。英语版本拥有更多信息，请阅读下文。

Pursuant to Resolution AG/RES. 2802 (XLIII-O/13) on the “Promotion and Protection of the Human Rights of People Vulnerable to, Living with or Affected by HIV/AIDS in the Americas,” which was adopted by the General Assembly of the Organization of American States in June 2013, as well as the collaboration agreement signed between the OAS and the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) in January 2014, both entities are collaborating on the preparation of a 

joint report on “The Social and Human Rights Dimensions of HIV in the Americas.

” The report will serve to inform discussions among Member States and between States and their allies on the challenges that exist to an effective response to HIV and the actions necessary to effectively and sustainably implement integrated care, prevention and support.

The Inter-American Commission of Women (CIM) of the OAS will coordinate the preparation of 

a chapter of this report on “The Human Rights of Women Living with HIV in the Americas

,” by compiling information from the national level through a questionnaire directed to OAS Member States and key civil society organizations, on four issues:

Access to support services and resources;

Inter-sectoral coordination and participation; and

We request your kind collaboration in returning the completed questionnaire no later than 

关于美洲患艾滋病的妇女人权的问卷

这个运动是“智能司法公平正义” 呼吁结束毒品战争和在美国的大规模监禁。英语版本拥有更多信息，请阅读下文。

For the last four decades, the USA has relentlessly expanded the size of our criminal justice system, needlessly throwing away too many lives and wasting trillions of taxpayer dollars. This criminal justice system is unproductive, wasteful, and dominated by racial disparities. Bad policies are made, and bad policies can be changed. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) campaign is called Smart Justice Fair Justice at it is already implementing solutions.

Join the fight against mass incarceration.

Some of the proposals include the following:

Over the last 40 years, we've spent trillions of dollars enforcing senseless drug laws. Drug use has not declined, while millions of people – disproportionately poor people and people of color – have been swept into a net of correctional control that is difficult to escape and derails lives. Many have been arrested just for having a small amount of drugs. Better solutions exist.

The hallmark of a legitimate justice system is fairness. And yet, today in America, hundreds of thousands of people are serving decades-long prison sentences that are far out of proportion to their crimes. The culprit? Extreme sentencing laws and mandatory minimum laws that strip judges of their ability to make the sentence actually fit the crime. It's time to change these laws.

 Some people and corporations – such as private companies that get larger payments from the state the longer they hold someone – have a vested interest in the status quo and are working to thwart smart reforms that could reduce incarceration. We need to incentivize smart and fair practices like keeping people in the community when they don't pose a threat.

 Hundreds of thousands of people are locked up not based on any dangerous behavior, but because they could not pay off a fine or were convicted of a nonviolent drug or property crime. Some behind bars are so frail because of old age or illness that they can barely walk. We need to rethink the costly practice of keeping these people behind bars.

 Problems like mental illness, substance use disorders, and homelessness are more appropriately addressed outside the criminal justice system altogether. Services like drug treatment and affordable housing cost less and can have a better record of success. It's time we got serious about pulling our money out of incarceration and putting it into systems that foster healthy communities.

美国公民自由联盟发起了一项活动：结束在美国的大规模监禁

通过参加今年的全球药物调查，你将成为世界上最大的药物使用模式调查的一部分！英语版本拥有更多信息，请阅读下文。

By taking part in this year's Global Drug Survey, you will be part of the biggest survey of drug use patterns in the world. Last year almost 80,000 took part in GDS2014. The target this year, with media partners in 19 countries and with the survey having been translated into 8 languages is 120,000. That’s a lot of experience, expertise and opinion to share.

参加2015年全球药品调查！

桑托斯和克莱格的会谈将被视为显著地加强了即将在2016年举行的联合国大会关于毒品的特别会议中毒品改革的新兴自由联盟的力量。英语版本拥有更多信息，请阅读下文。

Nick Clegg wants the UK to take a lead role in forging an alliance between European and Latin American countries aiming to reform global drugs laws focused on prohibition.

The deputy prime minister believes that the UN special session on drugs in 2016 offers a “unique opportunity” to push for alternatives to the current system. “We need to seize it,” Clegg said. “The war on drugs has failed and there are now a large number of states who agree on the need for change.”

Clegg was speaking after meeting Colombia’s president, Juan Manuel Santos, for talks about his country’s peace negotiations with the Farc guerrillas and what both see as an emerging international consensus for reform of international drugs policy.

The talks between Santos and Clegg will be seen as a significant strengthening of the emerging liberal alliance on drugs reform, a move heavily resisted by the Lib Dems’ coalition partners.

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