Over the last one hundred years, the global drug prohibition regime has established an innovative, resilient, corrupt, extractivist and transnational economic system. 

By criminalizing plants of traditional use and their users, prohibitionist policy ensures that the violence of repression and environmental destruction remain localized in certain territories and social groups, while financial profits circulate across borders. 

It is a system that rewards logistical control, territorial monopoly and infrastructural camouflage while punishing transparency and community governance. Its intersectional effects are particularly visible in Latin America due to the geographic concentration of coca and cocaine production. 

Prohibition transformed coca, a sacred Indigenous plant, into the raw material of a war economy — without ever reducing the production or use of cocaine. Instead, supply and demand continue to break historical records.

From forest to dust: Socioeconomic and environmental impacts of the prohibition of the coca and cocaine production chain in the Amazon Basin and Brazil

 – Repeated and systematic lethal attacks by the United States military on boats in the Caribbean and Eastern Pacific raise grave concerns about the commission of potential international crimes, UN experts* warned today.

“These attacks appear to be unlawful killings carried out by order of a Government, without judicial or legal process allowing due process of law,” the experts said.

Since 2 September 2025 there have been at least 15 strikes reported by U.S. officials, with 64 persons alleged to have been killed, and three survivors.

 that the attacks were against suspected illicit drug traffickers, and submitted that they were conducted as part of a fight against “narco-traffickers” or “narco-terrorists” operated by groups which the United States has designated as terrorist organisations.

Unprovoked lethal strikes by the United States against vessels at sea may amount to international crimes: UN experts

More than 100 U.S. and international organisations have urged Congress to investigate President Trump’s lethal military strikes in the Caribbean and his deployment of military forces in U.S. communities. The sign-on letter denounces these actions as unlawful, escalating the failed and violent “war on drugs”.

 Executive Overreach Regarding Extrajudicial Killings in International Waters And Militarized Responses in U.S. Communities

Dear Chair Wicker, Chair Rogers, Ranking Member Reed, and Ranking Member Smith:

We write on behalf of the 108 undersigned U.S. and international civil society organizations to sound the alarm about President Trump’s escalated U.S. military engagement in law enforcement and drug control operations. We respectfully urge the Senate Committee on Armed Services and the House Committee on Armed Services of the United States Congress to formally investigate the lethal military strikes that took place in September and October 2025 in the Caribbean Sea against vessels alleged to be carrying illegal drugs, as well as the Administration’s deployment of the National Guard and active duty military personnel for law enforcement purposes in U.S. communities. Based on the available information, the recent lethal strikes on alleged drug vessels in the Caribbean have no basis in either U.S. or international law and appear to constitute extrajudicial executions. President Trump’s assertion of sweeping authority to wield lethal military force against alleged drug smugglers and his vows to order more such strikes require urgent action by Congress to prevent further harms.

Military Strikes in September and October 2025

Without congressional authorization, the Trump Administration deployed navy warships and other military assets to the Southern Caribbean. The stated mission of this military operation was to counter drug trafficking. On September 2, on Trump’s orders, the U.S. military struck a boat alleged to be transporting drugs, killing all eleven people reportedly on board. The military strikes were supposedly targeting members of Tren de Aragua, which was designated a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) pursuant to Section 219 of the Immigration and Nationality Act. On September 15, the U.S. military struck another vessel alleged to be transporting drugs in the Caribbean, killing three people on board. On September 16, the president told reporters that a third had also been destroyed, claiming “We knocked off actually three boats, not two, but you saw two.” On October 3, the military conducted a fourth strike, killing all on board, according to U.S. officials. On October 14, the president stated that a fifth boat strike took place killing six people.

The White House justification for these killings does not pass legal scrutiny under national or international law. President Trump claims that these actions were taken to further U.S. national security and foreign policy interests. However, his Administration has not provided any evidence that could justify the premeditated killing of people on board the vessels, nor has it referenced any plausible legal or constitutional authority for conducting these lethal military strikes. No evidence has been presented that would suggest the boats were armed or were preparing to attack the nearby U.S. military vessels. To the contrary, recent reporting indicates that the first boat appeared to be turning around when it was pursued and struck repeatedly until it was destroyed. Nor has the administration explained why the usual interdiction process (arresting those on board) was not used and options short of lethal force were considered inadequate.

Threat of Continued Military Strikes without Legal Authority

Trump Administration officials have boasted about the lethal strikes and vowed to conduct more such strikes against those they deem to be “narcoterrorists” without providing a clear strategic and legal justification to Congress or the public. On his recent visit to Mexico and Ecuador, Secretary Rubio has encouraged those and other governments to cooperate with the U.S. campaign, claiming that: “They're going to help us find these people and blow them up, if that's what it takes.” The administration has deployed fighter jets to a Puerto Rico airfield, and are reportedly considering options to strike alleged cartels inside Venezuela. Secretary of Defense Hegseth has also claimed the boat strikes are part of a broader U.S. military campaign in the region.

Throughout this summer, President Trump has deployed, and threatened to deploy, the National Guard and Marines to cities within the United States. In Los Angeles, as communities protested against the dangerous actions of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the Administration responded with the deployment of war-trained military officers and predator drones. Weeks later, the president federalized Washington, D.C. law enforcement and sent hundreds of National Guard, immigration, and other federal agents to address “crime.” The Administration has also moved to send federal troops to Memphis, Chicago, and Portland to crack down on crime. These actions, whether they come in the form of increased deployments in the Caribbean, Latin America, or in U.S. cities themselves, are interconnected facets of presidential overreach.

This executive overreach marks the intensification of failed, antiquated drug war logic that has been used for decades to militarize public safety as both a foreign policy and domestic policy within the United States. The decades-long war on drugs in Latin America has failed to curb drug trafficking in the Western Hemisphere, while fueling violence and resulting in grave human rights violations. There’s no evidence that leaning into this failed approach will help communities struggling with addiction, especially in the face of dramatic funding cuts to public health. Despite trillions of dollars spent to stop the illicit drug supply, illegal drugs remain plentiful and readily available. Crackdowns are short-lived, markets adjust, and drug suppliers respond to enforcement pressures by devising and producing more potent and dangerous drugs that are easier to conceal and transport. For example, when the U.S. federal government criminalized all fentanyl-related substances in 2018, overdose deaths rose by 60% in four years—from 67,367 deaths in 2018, to 107,941 in 2022. The policy further opened the door for newer drugs to enter the market and our streets. The Trump administration’s choice to engage in lethal military operations against those suspected to be transporting drugs is a deeply alarming escalation of this failed approach.

The lethal military strikes against alleged drug boats in the Caribbean that have been conducted by the Trump administration in September and October appear to have been entirely lawless acts, and may be merely the opening salvos in a wider military campaign. This situation demands a prompt and thorough response from Congress. We therefore urge you to aggressively conduct congressional oversight, act to prevent any more such killings from taking place, ensure proper accountability under the law for those responsible, and create clear legal and funding limits on the Executive’s sweeping claims for the authority to engage in such lethal strikes.

Open letter: Executive overreach regarding extrajudicial killings in international waters and militarized responses in U.S. communities

The global war on drugs as authoritarian statecraft and its human rights costs

Cocaine trafficking through West Africa fuels local addiction

Despite rift with U.S., can Colombia revolutionize global drug policy?

Earlier this year, world leaders agreed on a landmark resolution to review the global drug policy regime during the 68th session of the United Nations Commission on Narcotic Drugs in Vienna. For more than six decades, international drug policy has been largely shaped by the U.S.-led “War on Drugs,” which has prioritized strict controls and punitive enforcement.

Now, there is increasing global recognition that existing policies have failed. Both drug production and consumption are higher than ever. In 2023, 316 million people consumed illegal drugs worldwide, a 22 percent increase from a decade prior. Cocaine is the fastest-growing illicit drug market, and nowhere has it grown faster than in Colombia. Between 2014 and 2023, coca cultivation in the country—which supplies 67 percent of the world’s coca—surged by 266 percent, according to the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime.

As the failures of prohibitionist policies have become more apparent, alternative approaches are gaining ground. Colombia, in particular, is trying to flip the script by spearheading global action for drug policy reform.

Yet whether Bogotá can transform the rigid U.N. drug system remains uncertain. Gustavo Petro, Colombia’s first avowedly leftist president, has pushed a progressive drug policy abroad. But he relies on the United States for counternarcotics aid and security cooperation, and this week, Washington decertified Bogotá as a drug control partner for the first time in nearly 30 years, with U.S. President Donald Trump saying that it is “failing demonstrably” in its counternarcotics efforts.

“President Trump has secretly signed a directive to the Pentagon to begin using military force against certain Latin American drug cartels that his administration has deemed terrorist organizations,” the 

 on August 8. “The order provides an official basis for the possibility of direct military operations at sea and on foreign soil against cartels.”

Using U.S. military force overseas against profit-seeking criminal organizations would be a grave mistake. If carried out in other nations’ territories without their governments’ consent, it would be considered a “breach of the peace” or an “act of aggression” under the UN Charter, or an “armed attack” under the Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance. In Latin America and the Caribbean, where sensitivities about U.S. military intervention are strong and cut across the political spectrum, few would find claims of “self-defense” convincing, and relations could be set back for many years.

International norms, though, are far from the only reason why military interventions against organized crime would be grave mistakes. They don’t make sense either practically or strategically. Here are five reasons why.

US: Five reasons why Trump’s anti-cartel military plan will fail

Over the years, the United States has waged a so-called ‘war on drugs’ in Latin America, adopting a strategy of geopolitical control that criminalises people, benefits transnational capital, and justifies military interference.

 has increased following President Donald Trump’s order to deploy troops and warships near Venezuela’s coast. 

This measure, framed by the White House as an effort to “use all its power” to “stop the flow of drugs” from Latin America, was justified by 

 that Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro leads an “illegitimate” government that constitutes a “narcotrafficking cartel”. Caracas has vehemently rejected this claim. 

Beyond the deployment of troops, the justification used by the Trump administration to “combat” drug trafficking in Latin America echoes the failed “war on drugs” that Washington has waged on the region for decades.

In fact, this new threat of military action confirms the failure of the very policy.

A flawed policy: The US war on drugs in Latin America criminalises people

A global reference on drug markets, trends and policy developments, the World Drug Report offers a wealth of data and analysis and in 2025 comprises several elements tailored to different audiences. The 

web-based Drug market patterns and trends

 contains the latest analysis of global, regional and subregional estimates of and trends in drug demand and supply in a user-friendly, interactive format supported by graphs, infographics and maps. 

 provide an overview of selected findings from the analysis presented in Drug market patterns and trends and 

the thematic chapters of Contemporary issues on drugs

, while Special points of interest offers a framework for the main takeaways and policy implications that can be drawn from those findings.

The World Drug Report 2025 is aimed not only at fostering greater international cooperation to counter the impact of the world drug problem on health, governance and security, but also at assisting Member States in anticipating and addressing threats posed by drug markets and mitigating their consequences.

To mark its launch, we are pleased to invite you to the World Drug Report 2025 Webinar for Civil Society, jointly organized by the UNODC Civil Society Unit and the Vienna NGO Committee on Drugs.

Time: 15:00 – 16:30 CEST (Vienna time, UTC+2) 

Opening Remarks: Billy Batware (UNODC Civil Society Unit) & Matej Košir (Vienna NGO Committee on Drugs)

Presentation of the World Drug Report 2025: Angela Me (UNODC Research and Analysis Branch)Civil Society Presentations:

Gisela Hansen (Dianova International) – 

Using the World Drug Report to promote gender- and age-sensitive drug policy

Leveraging data from the World Drug Report to strengthen civil society submissions to UN human rights treaty bodies

World Drug Report 2025

Expectations are running high in both Bogotá and Washington that Colombia could be decertified in 2025 for its supposed failure to meet Washington’s drug policy goals, ending a three-decade run of compliance. A large part of U.S. aid to Colombia depends on the annual certification process, which determines whether the country is meeting Washington’s criteria for satisfactory cooperation in fighting illicit drugs. The U.S. is Colombia’s largest trading partner and strongest military ally. If decertified, Colombia stands to lose hundreds of millions of dollars in military and police aid, face punishing economic sanctions and visa restrictions, and see a freeze in longstanding political ties. The U.S. would likely feel repercussions as well, since Colombia provides Washington with crucial intelligence as well as forces primed to carry out joint operations.

The country’s failure to meet benchmarks for the reduction of coca crops, the raw material for cocaine, is the main source of Washington’s gripes. Suspending forced eradication of the plant has been a project of President Gustavo Petro’s government, which has drawn on abundant evidence to argue that destroying crops has exacted a heavy toll on poor farmers and the rural areas they inhabit while failing to curb the market for cocaine. Still, with 253,000 hectares under cultivation, Colombia has today reached its highest-ever levels of both coca leaf and refined cocaine production since the UN started monitoring in 1999. Volumes of drug seizures have risen, reaching 848.5 tonnes of cocaine in 2024 – almost double the 2019 total – but officials fear this number may simply mean that more drugs than ever are leaving Colombia. Complicating matters further, the relationship between Petro and President Donald Trump is troubled. Colombia only narrowly avoided harsh sanctions in January over its reluctance to accept U.S. military deportation flights, in a spat that saw the two leaders exchange fierce diatribes on social media.

The rise in cocaine production and chill in bilateral ties have seen attention turn to the U.S. certification process, a longstanding feature of Washington’s war on drugs, dating back to 1986. Before 15 September of every year, the U.S. president must make a determination as to whether major drug supplier and trafficker countries are complying with Washington’s counter-narcotic objectives. States must show that they are meeting commitments established in the UN Convention against Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances and the 1986 Narcotics Act, as well as fulfilling relevant bilateral agreements that could include everything from limiting drug supply and extraditing criminals to policing borders and countering money laundering. Although the certification process is built around clear criteria, the decision is made by the U.S. president and profoundly influenced by political and diplomatic considerations. Past administrations have repeatedly certified Colombia despite concerns about inadequate compliance because, in their view, preserving close cooperation with Bogotá was more advantageous to Washington.

Colombia braces for U.S. censure over faltering drug war

In recent years, the global narcotics landscape has undergone dramatic transformation—most notably with the surge of synthetic opioids like fentanyl, which are reshaping illicit markets and accelerating overdose crises, particularly in North America. From trade tensions between the U.S. and China to Europe’s expanding cocaine market and the UK’s record drug-related death rates, the intersections between drug policy, public health, and international relations have never been more urgent.

Recent developments—including the ground breaking inclusion of “harm reduction” in a United Nations (UN) Commission on Narcotic Drugs resolution—signal a shift toward more compassionate, evidence-based policies. As pressure mounts to move beyond outdated, enforcement-led frameworks, this discussion will examine how diplomacy, multilateral cooperation, and legal regulation can foster a more coherent and humane global response to drug policy challenges.

This panel will explore the complexities between reform advocates calling for continued momentum, traditionalists prioritizing law enforcement led approaches, and the growing cracks in the global drug control consensus.

Transnational & organised crime

From forest to dust: Socioeconomic and environmental impacts of the prohibition of the coca and cocaine production chain in the Amazon Basin and Brazil

Unprovoked lethal strikes by the United States against vessels at sea may amount to international crimes: UN experts

Open letter: Executive overreach regarding extrajudicial killings in international waters and militarized responses in U.S. communities

The global war on drugs as authoritarian statecraft and its human rights costs

Cocaine trafficking through West Africa fuels local addiction

Despite rift with U.S., can Colombia revolutionize global drug policy?

Despite rift with U.S., can Colombia revolutionize global drug policy?

US: Five reasons why Trump’s anti-cartel military plan will fail

A flawed policy: The US war on drugs in Latin America criminalises people

World Drug Report 2025

Colombia braces for U.S. censure over faltering drug war

Global drug policy: How to win the war?