Objections to Bolivia's reservation to allow coca chewing in the UN conventions

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Objections to Bolivia's reservation to allow coca chewing in the UN conventions

7 January 2013

By Tom Blickman, Transnational Institute

The United States, United Kingdom, Sweden, Italy and Canada notified their objections.

Sweden joined the United States and the United Kingdom in objecting to the re-accession of Bolivia to the 1961 UN Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs after Bolivia had denounced the convention and asked for re-accession with a reservation that allows for the traditional age-old ancestral habit of coca chewing in the country. Italy also objected, but the objection of Sweden is particularly disturbing.

The 1961 UN Single Convention stipulates that the chewing of coca leaves should be phased out within 25 years of its coming into force end 1964. This verdict was based on a bla­tantly prejudiced report from the Commission of Enquiry on the Coca Leaf of 1950, containing no serious evidence for the ban.

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