For as long as most of us can remember, the United States has led the charge in the global “War on Drugs”. This disastrous 50-year-old experiment in criminalising people who use drugs while spending billions on law enforcement has caused untold harm and suffering across the world (including New Zealand), especially for Black people, Indigenous peoples, and people of colour.

So even though Biden’s announcement will only affect the relatively small number of people with federal cannabis convictions (most minor cannabis offences are prosecuted at a state level), the fact it came from a serving US president is momentous, and signals the latest in a global shift away from the catastrophe of prohibition.

Over the weekend we launched a petition calling on the New Zealand government to decriminalise cannabis and follow Biden’s lead by pardoning cannabis use and possession convictions. 

Why Aotearoa / New Zealand should decriminalise cannabis and overturn convictions

Many people, myself included, were sure that President Jair Bolsonaro’s misrule would end in Brazil’s first round of elections, held on October 2. Polls had Workers’ Party opponent and former president Lula da Silva consistently well ahead, and just about on course to exceed the 50 percent of the vote required to take the presidency without the need for a runoff. Bolsonaro was shown running 14 points behind “Lula,” but the polls had significantly underestimated the far-right president’s support. It was a shock to nearly all when Bolsonaro won 43 percent to Lula’s 48 percent—taking them both to a second round of elections set for October 30.

As we brace for the outcome, we must also reckon with the fact that that a president who openly promotes state violence against people who use drugs has not been rejected by the public, and that harm reduction in Brazil faces an uphill battle no matter who prevails.

Brazil harm reduction faces an uphill battle, even if Bolsonaro is ousted

The Czech Republic is the first country in Central-Eastern Europe that announced to make the non-medical use of cannabis legal. In this episode of Drugreporter Café, we present an interview with Jindrich Voboril, the National Drug Coordinator, who explained us how they will regulate the legal market.

Watch this episode – or if you don’t have time, you can listen to it as a podcast on Spotify, you can find the link below! Share this with your friends, peers!

How will Czechia legalise cannabis?

Statement delivered at the 38th Meeting of the 51st Regular Session of the Human Rights Council, on 5 October 2022

Thank you very much. Good afternoon, everyone.

We are here now to discuss the human rights situation in the Philippines in the context of the UN Joint Program, where it is, potentially, a very good opportunity for us to make positive changes. Under this Joint Program, there also is a clear risk, actually, of institutionalizing human rights violations under a UN Joint Program for Human Rights.

I struggled with this. Because how can we move forward and fix things if we are not honest about what has been happening and continue to be happening? And we quibble over numbers instead of acknowledging the wrongs that have been committed against Filipinos, and where we should be facilitating accountability?

I struggle. For how can claims be made to address human rights violations when, many times, there is no clear understanding of where the violations are coming from? And this is especially true when we speak of treatment and health where actions and programs remain punitive and repressive.

There also continues to be a culture of surveillance and control. We have a very bad habit of tagging and labeling people. In the drug response, people continue to be placed on lists, and where it becomes so easy to scapegoat and arrest and kill in the name of the drug response. Where we lay blame where there should be none. We have arrested people on the lists, and heard reports where evidence is planted. It has also become easy to fabricate drug charges against individuals that have been considered as enemies, and letting them languish in jail.

The message seems to be: if it's drugs, we'll fix you or else. And this is the same kind of thinking that has fueled tens of thousands of people getting killed. Quibbling over numbers will not make this reality less real.

The Joint Program is a space, a unique space where government and civil society are able to work together. But we have to be seriously committed to create the changes that the Joint Program was intended for, and where it should not simply be a laundry list (of activities), a ticking-off exercise. We need to make sure that the programs really do translate to positive changes on the ground.

So, when we say we do training, for example, or capacity building, what are we capacitating people for? How would we assess being capacitated? How do we assess that these programs, these training programs, actually translate to engagements on the ground that protect and safeguard human rights? These are the questions that we need to be asking instead of asking whether somebody attended a program or not. Or, just quibbling over or ticking off the number of attendees in programs, ticking off the number of graduates in community-based programs. Instead of really trying to see, to ask the questions that we need to be asking:

Are these programs improving quality of life of individuals?

And, in doing programs under the Joint Program, are we sure we are not placing people in greater harm? How many have, in good faith, attended so-called community-based programs only to miss the last half because then, it was found out, they had been killed?

If we talk about health response, why are we not urgently setting in place harm reduction services that can protect and save lives? We have the evidence. Why are we ignoring that?

How come until now we have no ethical standards set in place? Where, as one government official said, harm reduction is good but sorry, we have a drug-free mandate.

The Joint Program does not exist in a vacuum. We have to recognize that there are laws, such as our drug law, that cause overcrowding in our prisons. We have sections of the drug law that are disproportionate where someone arrested for selling less than one gram of methamphetamine is dealt a life sentence. A penalty much, much harsher than for homicide.

Why are there laws and regulations, policy issuances, and (legislative) bills where information-gathering and surveillance are the norm? We have to stop the lists.

We must continue monitoring the Joint Program. The work is not done. We have opened an opportunity where the potential is great. If we drop the ball now and cease to continue to be critical and thorough in monitoring, we will have missed an opportunity from which other nations can learn. And we would miss the opportunity to put in place safeguards and protections for the next generation. Now is the time to put things in place.

I will take seriously what has been said (by the government) about working with civil society organizations. Civil society organizations are the ones working on the ground. We are here to help, to create the kind of environment that truly protects human rights.

And, one last thing -- to make real changes happen there are prerequisites. None of any of our recommendations will bring about meaningful change if it still lives within the narrative of living in a drug-free Philippines. This narrative is getting us stuck. If we continue with this narrative, we will continue to violate human rights.

So, I ask you again, as we continue discussions -- the Joint Program is an opportunity. There are words in the Joint Program; let them not be empty words. We can work together, but there has to be serious commitment among all those who are involved.

Philippines: If we continue with "drug free", we continue to violate human rights

Prison population data reveal a much faster growth in female than male prisoner numbers since the year 2000. While the number of women and girls in prison has grown by almost 60%, the male prison population increased by around 22%.

This fifth edition of the World Female Imprisonment List, by 

, shows that more than 740,000 women and girls are in prison globally.

The List is published by the Institute for Crime & Justice Policy Research (ICPR) at Birkbeck, University of London. The List provides information on the number and percentage of female prisoners in almost all countries across world. It also includes information about trends in female imprisonment in countries and regions and by continent.

More than 200,000 female prisoners are in the United States of America (about 211,375). The countries with the next highest totals are China (145,000 plus an unknown number of women and girls in pre-trial detention and ‘administrative detention’), Brazil (42,694), Russia (39,120) and Thailand (32,952).

The countries with the highest female prison population rate – that is, the number of female prisoners per 100,000 of the national population – are the USA (64), Thailand (47), El Salvador (42), Turkmenistan (38), and Brunei Darussalam (36). In both Asia and Oceania, the total number of female prisoners has more than doubled since 2000. Europe, in contrast, has seen a fall (of 13%) in the female prison population.

The number of women and girls in prison has risen particularly sharply in some countries since around 2000; notably in:

Cambodia – there are more than nine times as many female prisoners today than in 2000

Indonesia – more than seven and a half times

Women and girls make up 6.9% of the global prison population. In African countries, the proportion of female prisoners is 3.3%, compared to 5.9% in Europe, 6.7% in Oceania, 7.2% in Asia, and 8.0% in the Americas. In 17 jurisdictions around the world, women and girls make up more than 10% of the prison population. Those with the highest proportions of female prisoners (excluding some very small jurisdictions) are Hong Kong-China (19.7%), Qatar (14.7%), Macau-China (14.1%), Laos (13.7%), Myanmar (12.3%), Vietnam (12.1%), Brunei Darussalam (11.9%), and the United Arab Emirates (11.7%).

Compiler of the World Female Imprisonment List, Helen Fair, comments:

The sustained and substantial rise in the numbers of women and girls in prison across much of the world is a cause of profound concern. It has long been recognised that most female prisoners are extremely vulnerable – with histories of poverty, mental illness and sexual and physical victimisation. Their incarceration makes little contribution to public safety, while imposing high financial and social costs. It is our hope that the data starkly presented in this World Female Imprisonment List will support and strengthen reformers’ calls to bring an end to unnecessary, damaging imprisonment of women and girls.

, Director of ICPR’s World Prison Research Programme, comments:

It is deeply troubling that the number of women and girls imprisoned worldwide has risen so dramatically in just two decades, far outstripping the rate of increase in male prisoner numbers. Huge increases have been seen in developed and less developed countries alike, with poverty, structural inequality, and the failed war on drugs the key underlying factors. Incarcerating more women for longer does nothing to address social injustice, simply causing further harm to those incarcerated, their families and communities.

World female prison population up by 60% since 2000

The ACT government has decriminalised small amounts of commonly used illicit drugs, becoming the first jurisdiction to do so in the country.

Under the new law, people found with amounts of certain drugs considered to be "personal possession" — smaller than trafficable quantities — would be subject to fines rather than criminal charges, and be referred for counselling.

The law, which will not come into effect for 12 months, applies to drugs such as heroin, cocaine and speed.

The legislation follows the recommendations of a Legislative Assembly inquiry into the proposal, which was tabled by Labor backbencher Michael Pettersson last year.

The ACT was the first — and remains the only — state or territory to legalise the personal use of cannabis, another of Mr Pettersson's bills.

The penalty for possession of a small quantity of the decriminalised drugs will be a $100 civil fine (that will not need to be paid if the person chooses to attend an illicit drug diversion class), a diversion or a caution.

Australian Capital Territory government decriminalises small amounts of illicit drugs

The War on Drugs has failed in its stated goal of reducing drug use and sale and has instead resulted in a devastating trail of trauma, pain, and suffering, for families, and communities, with communities of colour facing the harshest impact.

Globally, Black Brown and Indigenous people are disproportionately targeted for drug law enforcement and face discrimination across the criminal justice system.

The War on Drugs has provided the architecture, in many ways, within which racist and colonialist laws, policies and practices can operate. Our work to decolonise drug policy seeks to raise awareness of the racism and colonialism underlying international drug control, and its impact on the health and human rights of individuals and communities in order to begin to dismantle these destructive policies.

This conversation between Imani Mason Jordan, Gracie Bradley and Shanice McBean took place via Zoom on Wednesday 8th

Decolonising drug policy: British policing, the war on drugs, and the everyday impacts of colonialism

," co-hosted by Release and Harm Reduction International.

is an interdisciplinary writer, artist, editor and facilitator.

is an activist, campaigner and writer and also the ex-director of

is an anti-racist organizer who has done, loads of wonderful work with

Intersecting drug policy and abolition in Britain: A conversation

 government should withdraw a draft law that would give the authorities broad powers to detain people in military-run “rehabilitation” centers, placing them at great risk of abuse, Human Rights Watch said today. The 

, submitted to parliament on September 23, 2022, would allow the compulsory detention in centers of “drug dependant persons, ex-combatants, members of violent extremist groups and any other group of persons.”

The Bureau of Rehabilitation Bill would establish a new administrative structure controlled by the Defense Ministry to operate “rehabilitation” centers staffed by military personnel. The proposed law, which human rights advocates have already 

, does not describe the basis for being sent for “rehabilitation,” but other recent government policies provide vague and arbitrary powers to forcibly “rehabilitate” people who have not been convicted of any crime.

“The Sri Lankan government’s proposed ‘rehabilitation’ efforts appear to be nothing more than a new form of abusive detention without charge,” said 

, South Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “The Rehabilitation Bill would open the door widely to more torture, mistreatment, and endless detention.”

Sri Lanka: Draft ‘rehabilitation’ law would spur abuse

Colombian President Gustavo Petro’s push for a major overhaul of the “war on drugs” is likely to cause tensions with Washington, but both sides appear to be proceeding with caution. Like its predecessors, the Biden Administration is reluctant to acknowledge the failure of the old tactics, but the burden will be on Petro to make the case that new approaches will work better.

Colombia has agreed with the United States on drug policies since the 1970s, with a focus on the Colombian Police and, later, the National Army. In 1996, the U.S. State Department said that the 

Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia

 (FARC) were directly engaged in narco-trafficking, which opened the door for deeper cooperation. With “Plan Colombia” in the 2000s, Bogotá made the war on drugs a central element of its counterinsurgency – and Washington became deeply involved despite the implications for human rights in affected regions.

The two countries put aerial eradication of coca crops and extradition of traffickers at the center of the relationship, even though the initiatives did not significantly reduce the production or flows of the narcotic into the United States. The cartels fragmented and grew more violent as they fought for control of the trade.

President Petro’s proposed reform is not the first challenge to the decades-old approach. A peace agreement between President Juan Manuel Santos and the FARC in 2016 challenged the nature and depth of cooperation. The accord included commitments in four areas: incentivizing coca growers to change crops (through agrarian reform and secure access to markets); stopping the traffic (through interdiction); eliminating money-laundering; and getting transit and consumer countries to do more to reduce demand. The goal was to reduce the trade and demand more than to criminalize the production of raw material.

Colombia: Will new drug policies damage U.S. ties?

It makes no sense,” said Joe Biden on October 6th, as he 

 the 6,000 or so Americans convicted of possessing a small amount of marijuana. Although cannabis is fully legal in 19 American states, at the federal level it is still deemed to be as dangerous as heroin and more so than fentanyl, two drugs that contributed to more than 100,000 Americans dying of 

 last year. But the president’s admission applies to drug policy more broadly. Prohibition is not working—and that can be seen most strikingly with cocaine, not cannabis.

cocaine into the United States has surged

. Global production hit a record of 1,982 tonnes in 2020, according to the latest data, though that is likely to be an underestimate. That record high is despite decades of strenuous and costly efforts to cut off the supply. Between 2000 and 2020 the United States ploughed $10bn into Colombia to suppress production, paying the local armed forces to spray coca plantations with herbicide from the air or to yank up bushes by hand. To no avail: when coca is eradicated on one hillside, it shifts to another.

The worst harm falls on producing and trafficking countries, where drug profits fuel violence. Murder in Colombia is three times more common than in the United States; in Mexico, four times. In some areas, drug gangs are so wealthy and well-armed that they rival the state, giving cops and officials the choice of 

 (silver or lead): be corrupted or be killed. Prohibition also sucks children out of school, as drug gangs favour recruits who are 

Joe Biden is too timid. It is time to legalise cocaine

The Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights this afternoon concluded its seventy-second session after adopting its concluding observations on the reports of El Salvador, Mongolia, Italy, Guatemala, Tajikistan and Luxembourg.

The concluding observations will be available on the 

Mohamed Ezzeldin Abdel-Moneim, Committee Chairperson, called on the States concerned to respond to the concluding observations and disseminate them widely.

Regarding the Committee’s work under the Optional Protocol, Mr. Abdel-Moneim reported that the Committee had examined three communications, declaring one of them inadmissible; examined two communications on the merits and found a violation of the Covenant in one of them; and decided to discontinue the examination of six individual communications. The Committee also adopted its report on follow-up to Views, which contained information on the implementation of one decision.

Further, the Committee adopted follow-up to concluding observation assessments for Israel, Norway and Senegal. These would be finalised as discussed and submitted to the States in the coming weeks, after which the assessment letters would be made public.

Mr. Abdel-Moneim said he was very pleased to announce that the revised draft of the general comment on Covenant obligations related to land had been adopted as revised during the session. The advanced version of the adopted general comment was expected to be available in mid-November.

The Committee had agreed to hold a day of general discussion at its next session on the future general comment on sustainable development. Further, it had decided to initiate work on two new general comments. The first would be on "economic, social and cultural rights in the context of armed conflicts”, and the second on “impacts of drug policies on economic, social and cultural rights”.

Mr. Abdel-Moneim said the Committee had also discussed and adopted its report on the seventy-first and seventy-second sessions.

The Chair encouraged States to submit reports under the standard procedure, including long overdue reports, until the Committee was able to generalise the simplified reporting procedure and operationalise the eight-year predictable review cycle. This would be possible when resources were available. The Committee hoped that the General Assembly would make a positive decision in this direction.

In the next session, the Committee would resume in a new composition. Mr. Abdel-Moneim looked forward to welcoming three new colleagues, but said that the Committee would greatly miss the three colleagues whose terms would come to an end at the end of 2022: Heisoo Shin, Rodrigo Uprimny and Renato Zerbini Ribeiro Leão. The imprints of these Experts’ work, he said, would be left on the Committee.

At the Committee’s seventy-third session, to be held in February 2023, the Committee will review the reports of Cambodia, China (with the reports of Hong Kong and Macao Special Administrative Regions), Lithuania, Panama, Portugal and Yemen.

Concluding observations in relation to drug policy

Preocupa al Comité que la penalización del consumo de drogas pudiera impedir a los consumidores tener acceso a programas adecuados de reducción de daño y a servicios de atención de la dependencia, fundados en evidencia y respetuosos de los derechos de los usuarios (art. 12).

El Comité recomienda al Estado parte que considere despenalizar el consumo de drogas y asegure la disponibilidad, accesibilidad y calidad de los programas de prevención del abuso de sustancias sicoactivas y de reducción del daño. Igualmente, le recomienda que asegure a los consumidores que los requieran, el acceso a tratamientos de dependencia que estén basados en evidencia y sean respetuosos de los derechos de los usuarios.

The Committee is concerned about the punitive approach to drug use and the insufficient availability of harm reduction programmes (art. 12).

The Committee recommends that the State party review its drug policy and legislation to bring them into line with international human rights norms and best practices, and improve the availability, accessibility and quality of harm reduction programmes.

UN CESCR adopts country reports highlighting rights violations related to drug policies and announces a general comment on their impact

President Biden on Thursday announced that he is taking executive action to pardon people convicted of simple marijuana possession under federal law and D.C. statute.

The pardons will be done through an administration process to be developed by the Justice Department, senior administration officials told reporters on a briefing call, and will cover citizens and lawful permanent residents.

"Sending people to prison for possessing marijuana has upended too many lives and incarcerated people for conduct that many states no longer prohibit," Biden said in a statement.

More than 6,500 people were convicted of simple possession between 1992 and 2021 under federal law, and thousands more under D.C. code, the officials said. Biden had promised the action during his campaign.

However, most convictions happen at the state level, leaving those pardons up to each governor.

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