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As Colombia’s leader, I know we must rethink the drugs war
Juan Manuel Santos
April 16 2016
The president of Colombia argues that his country’s narco-related violent history illustrates exactly why a global rethink on prohibition should be the key discussion at this week’s UN general assembly special session on drugs
ow does one explain to a Colombian peasant in a rural community in the south-west of the country that he will be prosecuted under criminal charges for growing marijuana plants, while a young entrepreneur in Colorado finds his or her legal recreational marijuana business booming?
This is perhaps the most glaring paradox in the global debate over the “war on drugs”. A war that on most counts shows little progress if contrasted with the amount of time, blood and treasure invested by so many nations with a view to dismantling a business that remains as strong and active as it was half a century ago.
During this period, Colombia has lost many of its best political leaders, policemen and soldiers, judges and prosecutors, in a relentless war against drug barons and their violent criminal organisations. Significant achievements have been made in terms of dismantling drug cartels, bringing to justice one drug kingpin after another, limiting their power, reducing the marijuana, coca and poppy cultivation, as well as the production of cocaine and heroin. But our gains have become other countries’ losses. Drug traffickers adapt and change, making progress reversible.
Starting on 18 April, the United Nations is to hold a special session of its general assembly to address these issues, and Colombia will be there to present its view forcefully, at a crucial juncture in the country’s history.
In this context, Colombia is close to reaching an agreement to end the 60-year armed conflict with Farc, the world’s longest-running guerilla insurgency – an agreement that is of special relevance to this discourse on the war on drugs. In post-conflict Colombia, Farc will change roles, from being an obstacle for effective action against drugs to a key ally of the government in contributing to illicit crops substitution, provision of information of routes and production facilities and de-mining efforts to facilitate eradication of coca production. That in itself is a game changer.
We have done much, but this cannot be an effort by one country alone. Vested with the moral authority of leading the nation that has carried the heaviest burden in the global war on drugs, I can tell you without hesitation that the time has come for the world to transit into a different approach in its drug policy.
This is not a call for legalisation of drugs. It is a call for recognition that between total war and legalisation there exists a broad range of options worth exploring if we want to take better care of drug consumers, protect our youth from drug abuse, collaborate to continue combating organised crime and provide alternative economic means to illegal crop farmers and vulnerable communities.
Colombia has played a leading role in promoting a regional and global debate in the hope that it will ultimately bring the international community closer to a broad consensus on this new approach.
After an interview with this newspaper in 2011 outlining our position, our first milestone was achieved in 2012 during the Summit of the Americas in Cartagena, where the heads of state of the western hemisphere agreed to establish a mandate for the Organisation of American States (OAS) to produce a report on options for refocusing the regional approach on drugs control. In 2013 the OAS concluded the analysis and presented its report to the region. Since then, the report has been debated all across the Americas and has influenced public policy changes and adjustments in various countries, including Colombia.
Colombia has lost many of its best political leaders, soldiers and judges in a relentless war against drug barons
During an extraordinary assembly of the OAS in September 2014 in Guatemala, the hemisphere approved a joint resolution that marked the beginning of a new phase in the regional approach to counter the challenges posed by the world drug problem.
This regional consensus provided momentum to the process, but we know that in order to achieve the best possible results we need to move into a global consensus. That is why the UN summit presents a golden opportunity to bring the international community behind this new approach.
Colombia and an important number of countries from the five continents have taken the lead in the road to the summit, known as Ungass 2016, with a proposal around four fundamental elements, four issues that need urgent attention if progress is to be made.
The first is to frame policy on drugs with a context of human rights, which stops victimising the victims of drug abuse. A policy to confront the world drug problem must include the provisions of the international human rights conventions along with the drug control conventions. Both sets of legal instruments share an ultimate goal, which is preserving the “health and wellbeing of humanity”. Under this principle, we expect to progress in preventing the stigmatisation of drug users, abolishing the death penalty for drug-related offences and obligatory treatments for drug abusers, among other measures.
The second is to achieve autonomy and flexibility under the current conventions. Without reforming or replacing the existing international drug control conventions, it should be possible to guarantee enough national autonomy for interpretation and flexibility to adopt national policies that take into account local realities and challenges – such as ours in Colombia, and other countries with their own situations and priorities.
Although they occur outside the international conventions, controlled experiments in regulating the drug markets should continue to develop, and be monitored by UN agencies, towards further discussion at the next summit following this next week, the 2019 Ungass.
Third, we need a transition from a purely repressive response towards a more comprehensive approach. We need to introduce a public health framework to the treatment of drug consumption focusing on prevention, attention, rehabilitation and re-socialisation of drug abusers. We must adopt alternatives to prison for drug-related offences, depending on the severity of the offence, and prioritising an effective rehabilitation and re-socialisation of offenders. We need to provide social and economic alternatives to small growers of illegal crops and other vulnerable communities in order to create the necessary conditions to bring them back to legality.
Fourth and last, we must persist in combating transnational organised crime. The implementation of the previous three elements should not affect national action and international co-operation in the effort to counter criminal rings associated with the illegal drugs business. On the contrary, all nations should increase their efforts and strengthen international co-operation initiatives to make this task a more effective one. Colombia will continue to offer its expertise and capabilities in combating these criminal enterprises to any country in the world that can benefit from our hard-earned experience.
No other nation has had to endure the terrible effects of the world drug problem in such magnitude and over such extended period of time as Colombia. The international community can rest assured that, when we call for a new approach, we are not giving up on confronting the problem; we are moved by the aim of finding a more effective, lasting and human solution.
source with links please click on http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/apr/16/war-drugs-colombia-un-new-approach
