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Colombia court upholds no jail time for drug use
Associated Press
Friday, June 29, 2012Colombia's Constitutional Court has ruled that people cannot be jailed for possessing cocaine and marijuana for personal use. The decision ratifies a previous Supreme Court ruling that said people cannot be jailed for possession of a so-called personal dose. A 2009 law placed the dose at up to 20 grams of marijuana and one gram of cocaine.
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USAID's Alternative Development policy in Colombia
A critical analysis
Ricardo VargasTNI Drug Policy Briefing Nr. 38
October 2011
Alternative Development (AD) must not be part of a militarised security strategy, which is the predominant approach in Colombia. Instead of simply attempting to reduce the area planted with illicit crops, Alternative Development programmes should operate within the framework of a rural and regional development plan.
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Alternative development from the perspective of Colombian farmers
Susana OjedaTNI Drug Policy Briefing Nr. 36
May 2011
Alternative Development programmes have been widely discussed from the point of view of experts, technocrats, politicians and academics, with advocates and detractors debating whether such programmes contribute to decreasing the cultivation of illegal crops. However, little is known about the opinions of the people targeted by these programmes and the implications that they have for their daily lives.
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Drug Laws and Prisons in Colombia
Systems Overload: Drug Laws and Prisons in Latin America
During the 20th century, drug policies in Colombia were increasingly repressive, largely ineffective, and heavily influenced by the international legal framework that was put in place. In effect, in just a few years Colombia went from having a scattered set of regulations, with an emphasis on prevention and medical-administrative treatment, to having legislation abundant in definitions of criminal conduct and sanctions that included the full drug cycle, from production through marketing and trafficking to consumption.
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Prohibition, a backwards step
The personal dose in Colombia
Diana Esther Guzmán & Rodrigo Uprimny YepesLegislative Reform of Drug Policies Nr. 4
January 2010
In December 2009, the Congress in Colombia passed a reform to the 1991 Constitution, which considered the possession and consumption of certain quantities of drugs for personal use legal, to enact constitutional prohibition. This briefing shows the changes that this constitutional amendment entails and evaluates the principle potential consequences.
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Alternative Developments, Economic Interests and Paramilitaries in Uraba
Moritz TenthoffTNI Drug Policy Briefing Nr. 27
September 2008
The following document analyses how the Forest Warden Families Programme and the Productive Projects of the Presidential Programme Against Illegal Crops in Colombia have been used to legalise paramilitary structures and implement mega agro-industrial projects in the Uraba Region.
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Cross Purposes
Alternative Development and Conflict in Colombia
Ricardo VargasTNI Drugs and Conflict Debate Paper 7
June 2003
The anti-drug strategy in Colombia limits the establishment of the basic political conditions necessary to attain the socio-economic goals of alternative development in the midst of war. President Álvaro Uribe's strategy only serves to make the ground fertile for more violence and instability.
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