As drug policy reform faces renewed repression and securitisation worldwide, 2026 will test whether evidence, human rights and community leadership can still reshape a system under strain — and where the next openings for change may emerge.
This event will examine key human rights standards on access to health and harm reduction in prisons, while sharing lessons learned from regional and international advocacy experiences.
As punitive drug policies regain ground, communities worldwide are mobilising to defend human rights, care and evidence-based responses through the Support. Don’t Punish Global Day of Action 2026.
RightsCon brings together global civil society, policymakers, technologists and advocates to confront urgent challenges at the intersection of human rights and technology, shaping strategies for a more open, secure and rights-respecting digital future.
Schneider et al. argue that criminalising sex work and drug use forces young sex workers into danger, undermining health and rights, and call for decriminalisation, safe supply and peer-led harm reduction.
Deep budget cuts to the UN’s human rights pillar will severely weaken the organisation’s ability to prevent abuses, protect defenders and support human rights.
Perseus Strategies and allies call on the UN to replace stigmatising criminal justice language with person-centred terminology to advance a human rights-based approach to justice, dignity and social reintegration.
By recommending that coca remain in the most restrictive category, the WHO has reinforced a decades-old, colonial classification that undermines scientific research and Indigenous rights.
