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Beyond 2008 – a truly remarkable event
Martin JelsmaSaturday, July 12, 2008
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Earlier this week, 7-9 July, 300 delegates met in Vienna for the Beyond 2008 NGO Forum meant to provide civil society input for the 10-year UNGASS review. It was the culmination of a series of regional NGO consultations that took place over the past six months all across the globe. Given the wide range of views held by NGOs many – including myself – were sceptical about the outcomes of the process. Would it really be possible to agree by consensus on a joint declaration and resolutions? Well, we did it… -
Ten Years
Monday, July 7, 2008
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Today over 300 NGOs from around the world, including TNI, are meeting in Vienna for 'Beyond 2008 - A Global Forum on the 1998-2008 Review of the United Nations General Assembly Special Session on Illicit Drugs'. The purpose of the Forum is to develop recommendations to the Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND) and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) as part of the ongoing UN review process on drug policy that will conclude in 2009. For the occasion, TNI published an overview of its work over the past decade. -
World anti-drugs day: mixed feelings
Martin JelsmaThursday, June 26, 2008
Thousands of bottles of alcohol are destroyed in Java to observe the International Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking in 2007.Today, June 26, is the official UN International Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking. At the TNI Drugs & Democracy programme we have always found it a difficult day to deal with, full of mixed emotions. Too often the day has been desecrated by countries eager to highlight their toughest anti-drug actions. That includes each year a high number of executions in China especially saved up for June 26th. Killing drug law offenders to celebrate a UN day, in spite of the General Assembly adopting last year a resolution opposing the death penalty.
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Humane drug policies
Tom BlickmanFriday, June 13, 2008
Chinese soldiers escort drug dealers to a public sentence on International Day against Drugs in 2005. Six of them were executed.At the UN High Level Meeting on AIDS, a group of civil society organisations collaborated to draft an open letter to senior UN officials to raise concerns about the UN-sponsored International Day against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking on June 26th. Many governments use the day to highlight repressive drug control efforts by publicising executions, arrests and drug seizures.
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High Level Meeting on AIDS
Wednesday 11 June 2008The 2008 High Level Meeting on AIDS opened on June 10 at the United Nations headquarters in New York under the theme 'Uniting the World Against AIDS'. Country delegations and civil society representatives from around the world meet to review progress towards the targets agreed in the UN's 2001 Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS and the 2006 Political Declaration on HIV/AIDS.
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Refreshing Costa's memory
Tom BlickmanSunday, June 8, 2008
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Today, June 8, it is 10 years ago that the world leaders gathered in New York for the United Nations General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS) on the World Drug Problem. "A drug free world – We can do it!", was the slogan under which they met. Ten years later, Mr. Costa, the current director of the UNODC seems to deny that the UN ever used the phrase. Let us refresh Mr. Costa’s memory. -
War Without End
Tom BlickmanSaturday, June 7, 2008
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An extraordinary documentary marking a new level in broadcast journalism critiquing the international war on drugs was shown on Irish TV last on 3 June 2008. The report is a comprehensive indictment of the global drug war and asks if there is an alternative to this war without end.
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Cannabis debate in Australia
Tom BlickmanWednesday, June 4, 2008
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In Australia a vicious debate on cannabis policy started when Alex Wodak, the head of the Sydney drug and alcohol clinic at St Vincent's Hospital, suggested that marijuana be regulated like alcohol or tobacco. He proposed to sell cannabis legally in post offices in packets that warn against its effects. -
INCB out of step with the United Nations
Tom BlickmanTuesday, June 3, 2008
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The United Nations should overhaul the operations of the International Narcotics Control Board (INCB), the quasi judicial body that monitors states’ implementation of their obligations under the UN drug conventions. The Board ignores UN policies and conventions which recognize the need to provide humane treatment to people addicted to injection drugs, according to a recent commentary in medical journal The Lancet. -
Costa in Amsterdam
Tom BlickmanMonday, June 2, 2008
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The head of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), Antonio Costa, recently visited Amsterdam on 24 April. Accompanied by some officials of the Netherlands Ministry of Health and of the City of Amsterdam and UNODC staff, he dropped in on the coffeeshop De Dampkring (the Atmosphere) and a user room (for inhalation and injection of heroin and cocaine). He wrote his personal account for his blog Costa’s corner but it was never published. Apparently it proved to be too controversial with his Dutch host. It now has popped up on the Transform drug policy blog and the ENCOD website.
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