Responding to the evolving drugs challenge: towards UNGASS 2016

More than thirty countries and institutions met at Wilton Park to consider what practical options they might pursue at the 2016 UN General Assembly Special Session on drugs policy. It was quickly apparent that there was a greater degree of common ground in some areas than would have been the case as recently as five years before. In particular, there was a general sense that the scope and flexibility in the UN Conventions was now recognised more readily and being used by member states to shape their own drugs policies more closely to the evidence from their own countries and elsewhere.

Discussion was grouped around five broad areas: demand reduction; supply reduction; new challenges; alternative development; and human rights. Out of the discussions as a whole, some key issues emerged as likely to be central to UNGASS 2016.

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