The truth behind the UNODC's leaked decriminalisation paper

The UNODC claims that the briefing is not a final or formal document, and does not amount to a statement of its policy position
Steve Rolles (Transform)
Tuesday, October 20, 2015

decrim-unodc-transformThe UN Office on Drugs and Crime has responded to the 'leak' of its paper calling for the decriminalisation of drug possession for personal use. The document was to be presented by the UNODC at the International Harm Reduction Conference in Kuala Lumpur, and an embargoed copy had already gone to select media (the norm for such publication events). When it was then pulled at the last minute, the BBC, which had already filmed a news segment on it, decided to release it anyway. Richard Branson was filmed for the segment, and was sufficiently annoyed when the UNODC backtracked, that he broke the story himself on his blog.