• Rocky Mountain high: Pot a $200M industry in Colorado

    The Seattle Times (US)
    Saturday, January 5, 2013

    marijuana-indoor-coloradoVigorous regulation of a thriving medical-marijuana industry in Colorado offers the best glimpse of what is coming to Washington when it launches its voter-approved social-use market. With continuous surveillance, bar-coded plants and strict financial background checks, Colorado's rules allowed capitalism to be unleased, creating an instant $200 million industry. With retail prices — averaging about $7.50 a gram — among the cheapest in the country.

  • Mexico considers marijuana legalization after ballot wins in U.S.

    Mexico, which has fought a long war against drug cartels that supply U.S. users, is rethinking its marijuana policy after Colorado and Washington approved legalization
    Los Angeles Times (US)
    Friday, January 4, 2013

    mexico-marijuana-protestThe success of legalization initiatives in Colorado and Washington has sparked a new conversation in a nation that is one of the world's top marijuana growers: Should Mexico, which has suffered mightily in its war against the deadly drug cartels, follow the Western states' lead? Mexico's new president, Enrique Peña Nieto, opposes legalization, but he also told CNN that the news from Washington and Colorado "could bring us to rethinking the strategy."

  • Has Bolivia's coca-growing scheme worked?

    We ask if the president's move to reject US drug eradication policies was the best for his country's coca farmers
    Al Jazeera
    Thursday, January 4, 2013

    bags-of-coca-leavesBolivian president Evo Morales, a former coca-leaf farmer, came to power promising to defend the right of Bolivians to produce coca for traditional uses. He kicked out the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) in 2009, and began the country's own system of regulating coca-leaf production. Morales' move brought heavy criticism from Washington, and led the US government to conclude that Bolivia was failing to meet its commitment to fight the production of cocaine. But a new WOLA report suggests that the country's unorthodox measures are working

  • Racism's hidden history in the war on drugs

    Judge Frederic Block, Federal judge
    The Huffington Post (US web)
    Wednesday, January 3, 2013

    reefer-madnessThe first anti-drug law in the US was a local law in San Francisco passed in 1875, outlawing the smoking of opium and directed at the Chinese. Marijuana prohibition also had racist underpinnings. This time it was the Mexicans. Just as cocaine was associated with black violence and opium with Chines white slavery, in the southwest border towns of the US marijuana was viewed -- beginning in the early 1920s -- as a cause of Mexican lawlessness. Cocaine regulations also were triggered by racial prejudice. Cocaine use was associated with blacks just as opium use was associated with the Chinese.

  • Many towns have no plans to ban tourists from cannabis cafes

    Dutch News (Netherlands)
    Tuesday, January 1, 2013

    coffeeshop-salesTourists will not be banned from a majority of the Netherlands’ cannabis cafes, despite new residency requirements which came into effect on January 1, according to a survey by NOS television. Coffee shops are required by law to ensure only official residents of the Netherlands are allowed to buy cannabis. However, the legislation gives scope for "local circumstances" to be taken into account. A survey by The Amsterdam Herald found more than a dozen municipalities are not planning to enforce the rule that customers must show evidence that they live in the Netherlands. (See also: Foreigners still welcome in Dutch coffeeshops)

  • Studying marijuana and its loftier purpose

    New insights on marijuana in Israel, where it’s illegal
    The New York Times (US)
    Tuesday, January 1, 2013

    Marijuana is illegal in Isramed-marijuana-israelel, but at a government-approved medical marijuana farm at a secret location near the city of Safed, is at the cutting edge of the debate on the legality, benefits and risks of medicinal cannabis. When Zach Klein, a former filmmaker, made a documentary on medical marijuana that was broadcast on Israeli television in 2009, about 400 Israelis were licensed to receive the substance. Today, the number has risen to about 11,000.

  • Brazil debates treatment options in crack epidemic

    Associated Press (US)
    Sunday, December 30, 2012

    With a boom in crack use ovcrackolandia-rioer the past decade, Brazilian authorities are struggling to stop the drug's spread, sparking a debate over the legality and efficiency of forcibly interning users. Brazil today is the world's largest consumer of both cocaine and its crack derivative, according to the Federal University of Sao Paolo. Adults can't be forced to stay in treatment, and most leave the shelters within three days. But children are kept in treatment against their will or returned to parents if they have a family.

  • Call for end to anti-drug aid for regimes with death penalty

    Human rights groups urge government to stop giving money to countries such as China and Iran
    The Observer (UK)
    Sunday, December 30, 2012

    death-penaltyHuman rights groups have urged the UK government to heed the recommendations of an influential parliamentary committee that has told the government to stop funnelling money into anti drug-trafficking programmes in countries that administer the death penalty. Over the past decade, the UK has given millions of pounds to help Pakistan, China and Iran combat drug smuggling. MPs and human rights groups are horrified by credible claims that the increased aid has met with a corresponding rise in arrests which, in turn, has led to more people ending up on death row, including several Britons.

  • Pro-marijuana campaign looks ahead after 2012 victories

    Reuters
    Sunday, December 30, 2012

    After a decades-long campaign to legalize marijuana hit a high mark in 2012 with victories in Washington state and Colorado, its energized and deep-pocketed backers are mapping out a strategy for the next round of ballot-box battles. They have their sights set on ballot measures in 2014 or 2016 in states such as California and Oregon, which were among the first in the country to allow marijuana for medical use. Although those states more recently rejected broader legalization, drug-law reform groups remain undeterred.

  • Parts of Colorado's pot legalization strategy exported to other states

    The Denver Post (US)
    Saturday, December 29, 2012

    colorado-marijuanaThe sequential strategy will look familiar to Coloradans: first, pass a medical-marijuana law; then put dispensaries in place; then go for recreational legalization. The Marijuana Policy Project (MPP) is pushing medical-marijuana laws in New York, Illinois and New Hampshire, along with contemplating a ballot initiative in Idaho. The true test for marijuana activists will come in 2016, the next presidential election year. That is when MPP hopes to run legalization initiatives in California, Massachusetts, Oregon and Maine.

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