UNODC Executive Director Yury Fedotov today met Lamberto Zannier, Secretary-General of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), to discuss a joint action plan that will see the two organizations cooperate in tackling organized crime and illicit drugs.
The European Drug Prevention Prize is awarded every two years to three drug prevention projects that fully involve young people, either in the development and implementation of activities, the decision-making, the project management and/or the evaluation.
For the past five years, Mexico has been engaged in a bloody confrontation with drug gangs. Mexican political scientist Eduardo Guerrero Gutierrez looks at how the struggle is going and the implications for Mexico's presidential election in July.
Just before ending 2011, Bolivia presented the formal notification to the United Nations secretariat in New York, announcing their re-adherence to the 1961 UN Single Convention, including a reservation on the use of coca leaf in its natural form, such as coca chewing and infusions.
The filming crew of the Hungarian Civil Liberties Union (HCLU) traveled to California and attended the International Drug Policy Reform Conference in LA to find out what are the latest development of the battle for legal marijuana in the US. We interviewed activists from several organizations, asked questions about the chances of state level ballot initiatives, we even saw how people will use cannabis in the 21st Century.
Health officials of the Basque Country, an autonomous region of Spain, announced that they will introduce a bill to regulate the "cultivation, sale and consumption" of hashish and marijuana. The bill, which will be presented to the regional parliament next year, was put forward on December 12, 2011, by regional health officials during the presentation of the regional addictions plan. Several media outlets broke the news as an intent to legalise cannabis use, while in fact the proposed legislation only aims to regulate cannabis user associations that cultivate for personal use.
The president of Bolivia, Evo Morales, yesterday asked inspectors of the International Narcotics Control Board (INCB) of the United Nations to support his petition to decriminalize coca leaf chewing or "akulliku" but acknowledged that he failed to convince everyone.
The new provision simplifies the procedures for amending the lists with controlled substances: from now on it will be easier to criminalize a new substance, once identified.
The new centre will service 12 Aboriginal people between the ages of 15 and 20, and has been specially designed to be more culturally welcoming for Aboriginal youths.
Opium production in Myanmar increased for the fifth consecutive year in 2011, while its price skyrocketed nearly 50 percent, United Nations officials declare.
YODA Europe is a new network of students and young people across Europe working to promote drug policies based on evidence and human rights. Get involved now!
Last week, Nobel laureates from Poland - Wislawa Szymborska and Lech Walesa called for change in the field of drug policy. The report made by the Global Commission on Drug Policy inspired the former President of Poland - Aleksander Kwaśniewski - to sign a letter with a statement that the global drug war has failed and the time for decriminalization, treatment and prevention has come.