The handling of drug-related cases and decriminalisation in Malta

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The handling of drug-related cases and decriminalisation in Malta

8 September 2014

Drug law reform is finally on the government’s agenda after years of drug legislation drift under previous Nationalist administrations. Over the years, the debate in Malta has swung between the headline-catching, but now widely discredited, policy of a ‘war on drugs’, to decriminalisation and legalisation in certain specific cases, and medical and social rehabilitation.

It is now widely recognised in most civilised countries and by world health authorities that drug users should be regarded by society as people who need medical help, not retribution.

Careful decriminalisation, or even legalisation, and treatment are now the practical way forward.

The government’s amendments to the current legislation will not begin to be debated until the House returns from its summer recess on October 15. Its draft law on drugs is enlightened and in keeping with the approach being adopted in most advanced European countries.

It proposes that users found in simple possession for the first time would appear before a justice commissioner, who would give warnings and impose administrative fines on the user. Repeat offenders would appear before a board that would set conditions for rehabilitation.

The reforms would not remove all criminal deterrents for drug use. The government is proposing that breaking the conditions set for repeat offenders would be viewed as a criminal offence.

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