Repairing the 'machinery' – Part 3: Aligning international drug policy with human rights, health and development

At the 68th session of the UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs in March 2025, Member States adopted Resolution 68/6, which establishes a multidisciplinary panel of 19 independent experts to review the existing machinery for the international control of narcotic drugs and prepare actionable recommendations ahead of the 2029 review.

This IDPC advocacy note argues that the Expert Panel’s review presents a historic opportunity to align the UN drug control system with health, human rights, social justice, development, and the health and welfare of humankind.

The note offers recommendations on how the Panel’s mandate should be interpreted, and proposes eight structural issues around which the Panel could frame its deliberations and final report:

1. Identifying more realistic, meaningful and measurable drug policy goals
2. Addressing the Vienna monopoly on drugs
3. Moving away from a criminal legal response
4. Prioritising the health response
5. Tackling the severe consequences of prohibition in cultivation areas, including on farmers and Indigenous Peoples
6. Addressing tensions and contradictions between the UN drug control system and human rights
7. Addressing the tension between the UN drug control treaties and practices of legal regulation
8. Ensuring improved participation for civil society, communities and Indigenous Peoples in UN drug policymaking.

This advocacy note should be read in conjunction with IDPC’s latest report, The UNGASS decade in review: gaps, achievements and paths for reform, which provides further background and detail on the issues discussed in the note.