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Drug criminalization as part of the ongoing war on drugs creates incredible economic and human harm across the world and it needs to change, according to a new report from the Global Drug Commission on Drug Policy released Monday.
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In what the Commission has been arguing for years, the report advocated the decriminalization of drugs, and to combat violence, organized crime, high incarceration rates and improve security, as well as public health while saving money.
Decriminalization, however, should not be confused with legalization. While decriminalization would differ across legal systems, people using drugs or in possession of a personal amount would not be hit by criminal sanctions, including a criminal record, jail time, or in some countries even death.
The report detailed that while millions of people use drugs in nonviolent ways, for different reasons ranging from religious to recreational, “the predominant approach of governments around the world is to criminalize those who use and/or possess drugs.”
The report “Advancing Drug Policy Reform: A new approach to decriminalization,” outlined five key recommendations for governments. States were urged to abolish criminal, civil and death penalties for drug-related offenses.
Furthermore, states were recommended to implement alternative measures for low-level and nonviolent people involved in the drug trade and “eventually explore regulatory models for all illicit drugs.” On the international level, U.N. member states were urged to remove the penalization of drug possession as part of international drug treaties.
The report also shared the testimonies of a number of people around the world and how current drug criminalization had adversely affected people's lives.
“Criminalization is leading every day, everywhere in the world to human rights abuses,” said Michel Kazatchkine, U.N. secretary-general special envoy on HIV/AIDS, in a press conference, making reference to state-sponsored killing of users and traffickers in the Philippines and the death penalty which still exists in a number of countries.
Kazatchkine also mentioned that in the U.S. in particular, drug criminalization for use and possession has “led to a wave of over incarceration,” where 1.5 million people were arrested in the U.S. in 2015 for drug offenses, 83 percent only for possession.
Former Colombian President César Gaviria and current commissioner noted in the press conference that the drug problem has negatively affected Latin America more than any other region.
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Gaviria said that targeting low-level usage is “a stupid and unuseful policy,” where “the only things that work are government regulations, every prohibition has failed.” In the report, Gaviria said that moving towards decriminalization was needed “to mitigate the harms of the last 60 years of wrong policies.”
Colombia is one of many countries whose society was affected by the ongoing U.S. backed war on drugs, kicked off under President Richard Nixon. It's strictly prohibitive approach has been a major factor in the U.S. having the highest level of prisoners in the world, but has also fueled transnational crime networks as well as foreign military intervention in attempts to control international drug supply.
In 2011, the commission’s report “unequivocally” declared that the war on drugs had failed. Drug reform around the world is still a social and political taboo. Many leaders on the local and international level are reluctant to present themselves as reformers fearing political backlash.
Nevertheless, politicians have regularly come out in favor of drug policy reform once they have left office. Along with Colombia’s Gaviria, former presidents of Brazil, Mexico, Portugal, Chile, Poland, a former prime minister of Greece, former deputy prime minister of the U.K., Kofi Annan, and Richard Branson were all commissioners in this year's report.
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