Millions of people suffering from HIV have for decades seen their needs ignored. Life-saving prevention and treatment that should reach everyone is often non-existent, arbitrary, or dependent on geography, gender, age or background.

"Closing the gap" is the theme of this year's World AIDS Day and it focuses on reducing the disparities in service provision that create these powerful inequities.

The UNAIDS campaign calls on everyone to empower and enable people everywhere to receive the evidence-based prevention and treatment they need. This means a level playing field for everyone by closing the testing, treatment and prevention access gaps.

UNODC assists people who use drugs, and people in prisons. Countries can help stem the epidemic among these populations, and by doing so, lend their support to the global target of ending AIDS by 2030.

But these gaps cannot be overcome without confronting the stigma, discrimination, and human rights breaches. No one facing HIV should be left behind or ignored. Laws and policies need to be reviewed to ensure drug users and prisoners have access to the necessary services, including harm reduction.

Keep up-to-date with drug policy developments by subscribing to the

Statement of the UNODC Executive Director, Yury Fedotov, on World AIDS Day

The destabilising effect of drug and weapon trafficking flows in West Africa and its impact on development and security are extremely serious. These transnational crimes hinder economic growth, reduce investment and efforts for peace, notably in the Sahel region. Underlying these problems, corruption is often seen as a facilitating factor which has evolved into a very sophisticated phenomenon. In this context, journalists can play a critical role in preventing and reducing corruption and, in particular, showing how it affects the daily lives of ordinary citizens.

Given the devastating effects of corruption and organised crime on human development and security in the Sahel, UNODC organised a four-day workshop for journalists from the region, in partnership with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and cultural Organization (UNESCO), the Panos Institute West Africa (PIWA), the African Network of Centers for Investigative Reporting (ANCIR) and the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP).

The workshop, held from 24 to 27 November 2014 in Saly, Senegal, allowed for well-known investigative journalists and less experienced journalists from 14 countries in West Africa to share knowledge and expertise in investigative techniques to expose corruption and organised crime. "By putting our knowledge together and communicating regularly among each other, we will be better informed and more efficient in our day-to-day work" said Mr. Samuel De Jaegere, UNODC's Anti-Corruption Advisor for West and Central Africa. Several journalists from Latin-America and Europe, all from countries on the "cocaine route" also took part in the meeting and shared their experiences.

Keep up-to-date with drug policy developments by subscribing to the IDPC Monthly Alert.

Investigative journalism in the Sahel: A critical role in tackling corruption and organised crime

After facing heavy criticism for the conditions inside its drug-rehabilitation centres, the Ministry of Health has said it will begin offering an alternative community-based approach at health centres nationwide by 2015.

Multiple reports have condemned torture and other abuses in the Kingdom’s eight rehabilitation centres, with the latest from Human Rights Watch in 2013 slamming them as “a means to lock away drug users and those suspected of drug use with considerably less effort and costs than would be incurred by prosecuting people in the justice system and … in prisons.”

According to Chhum Vanarith, a secretary of state in the Health Ministry, the alternative approach has already been piloted at 21 health centres in the capital and Banteay Meanchey.

“People always criticise that the treatment in the [rehabilitation] centres is breaking human rights and involves illegal detention, so we plan to provide services directly to health centres in each community,” he said at a conference in Phnom Penh yesterday.

Ministry officials said that needle exchanges will also be included in the project.

'Alternative' approach for people who use drugs in Cambodia

Today on World AIDS Day 2014 we ask you to join us and speak out in solidarity with people living with and affected by HIV.

We have come such a long way—today new HIV infections are declining, better and simpler treatment is now available and people living with HIV are now living longer and healthier lives.

But significant challenges remain and we need to fast-track change.

We must close the gap between people who have access to HIV prevention and treatment and people who do not. We must close the gap between people with opportunities and people who are being left behind.

But gender inequalities, violations of human rights and even our own attitudes can leave people behind. People most affected by HIV often don’t have access to the HIV services they need. Stigma and discrimination drive people underground and away from lifesaving HIV prevention and treatment.

Joint statement by UNAIDS International Goodwill Ambassadors

In October 2014, a consultation on police and HIV took place in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. The following interviews are with some of the country focal points of the Law Enforcement and HIV Network (LEAHN), each of whom is a serving or a retired senior police officer, and each of whom is committed to ensuring that the police make a positive contribution in their countries and the global HIV response.

The Consultation on Police and HIV was co-convened by LEAHN – Law Enforcement and HIV Network, IDLO – International Development Law Organization and Birkbeck, University of London.

The meeting produced the 'Amsterdam Declaration on Police Partnerships for Harm Reduction' which can be downloaded from LEAHN‘s website leahn.org .

Video produced by georgetownmedia.de for CLEPH – Centre For Law Enforcement & Public Health

HIV and harm reduction: policing key populations 

World Aids day is being marked by a series of events across the globe.The virus which causes Aids - HIV - was first identified by scientists more than 30 years ago. Claudia Hammond explains how it first spread, and where it stands today.

World Aids Day: Where did it come from?

1 декабря мы рады представить Вашему вниманию короткий фильм, который призывает увеличить финансирование программ снижения вреда. Почти 13 миллионов человек в мире употребляют инъекционные наркотики. И во всех странах, кроме Африки южнее Сахары, на их долю приходится 30% новых случаев ВИЧ-инфекции. Программы снижения вреда доказали свою эффективность в борьбе с ВИЧ-инфекцией, а также в социальной интеграции людей, которые употребляют наркотики. Снижение вреда восстанавливает семьи. Снижение вреда объединяет сообщества. Снижение вреда спасает жизни. Снижение достигает результатов. Снижение вреда нуждается в финансировании!

наркополитики, подписавшись

Снижение вреда нуждается в финансировании!

On December 1st we are delighted to share with you a short film calling for increased funding for harm reduction. Almost 13 million of people around the world inject drugs. And outside of sub-Saharan Africa they accounts for estimated 30% of new HIV infections. Harm reduction programmes have proven efficient in reducing HIV spread, as well as providing social support to people who use drugs and those close to them. Harm reduction restores families. Harm reduction rebuilds communities. Harm reduction saves lives. Harm reduction works. Harm reduction needs funding!

Keep up-to-date with drug policy developments by subscribing to the IDPC Monthly Alert.

Harm Reduction needs funding

Of course we know that young people are getting stopped and searched loads, but we wanted to find out exactly how many. We sent out Freedom of Information Requests to police forces across England and Wales and calculated that 142,121 young people under the age of 18 were stopped and searched last year (April '13 to March '14) and less than 11% of them led to an arrest. The Metropolitan Police in London carried out almost 39% of these.

What's more, Y-Stop and our partners StopWatch now have data that shows very young children are also being routinely stopped and searched across the country. Only a few police forces were able to tell us the ages of those they searched and from these we calculate that at least 120 children under the age of 10 have been stopped and searched over this same year, 68 of those being in London. 10 years old is the minimum age of criminal responsibility, meaning that children under 10 cannot be charged for a criminal offence.

The practice of stopping and searching and arresting children, even toddlers, conflicts with this and raises several child welfare issues. Y-Stop sees first-hand thedevastating impact that these sorts of encounters with the police can have on children and aims to help them to manage these situations better. Why not check out our resources for advice and tips on handling stop and search?

StopWatch will be publishing the findings of our research and exploring these issues in more detail over the coming months.

How many young people are being stopped and searched in the UK?

随着在其领土上的大麻监管运动，美国面临了一个困境，其区域所希望保护的与其总系统希望遵守的原条约相矛盾。英语版本拥有更多信息，请阅读下文。

随时掌握与药物政策发展相关的最新信息。

A joint contribution by: Professor Dave Bewley-Taylor, Martin Jelsma and Damon Barrett

State-level cannabis reforms, which gathered steam this month, have exposed the inability of the United States to abide by the terms of the legal bedrock of the global drug control system; the 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs. This is something that should force a much-needed conversation about reform to long-standing international agreements. But while ostensibly 'welcoming' the international drug policy reform debate, it is a conversation the US federal government actually wishes to avoid. The result is a new official position on the UN drugs treaties that, despite its seductively progressive tone, serves only to sustain the status quo and may cause damage beyond drug policy.

The 1961 Single Convention has been massively influential. Almost every state in the world is bound to prohibit cultivation, trade and possession of cannabis and a range of other substances such as coca and opium for anything but medical and scientific purposes. Wherever you are, your drugs laws are probably modeled on this agreement.

The United States has been a staunch defender of this legal regime. The treaties are central to its foreign policy on drugs, including in Latin America. But at home the government has been clear that it will not trample on the will of voters with regard to cannabis, even though this places it in breach of the 1961 Convention. So the US faces a predicament; a treaty breach it does not wish to admit within a system it wishes to protect.

致命的吸引力：布朗菲尔德的灵活性学说和全球毒品政策改革

这个小组座谈会在纽约召开，一些联合国机构如UNDP和UNAIDS的代表, 联合国大学，国家官员和民间社会的代表参加了座谈。英语版本拥有更多信息，请阅读下文。

This panel discussion on "The road to the United Nations General Assembly’s special session on the World Drug Problem 2016 (UNGASS 2016)" was organised by the United Nations University (UNU).

通往2016年联合国大会关于世界毒品问题的特殊会议（UNGASS 2016）的途径

随着大麻和刑事司法改革在一些州得到通过，毒品政策改革已经成为一个主流和迫切的需求。英语版本拥有更多信息，请阅读下文。

With marijuana legalisation measures passing in Oregon, Alaska and Washington, D.C., and with groundbreaking criminal justice reforms passing in California and New Jersey, there's no longer any denying that drug policy reform is a mainstream -- and quite urgent -- political demand.

These wins will boost efforts already underway in states such as California, Massachusetts, Maine, Nevada and Arizona to end marijuana prohibition in 2016, as well as efforts in Congress and around the country to scale back the disastrous policies of mass incarceration.

And speaking of 2016, yesterday's results now mean that Presidential candidates and other prominent candidates for public office will have no choice but to take positions on these issues, which could prove to be another tipping point in national politics. While some major politicians have yet to evolve on marijuana legalization and drug policy reform, that’s likely to change in the coming months and years, as drug war proponents start to pay a heftier price at the polls for their cluelessness.

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