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The Prospects for Drug Reform: California
Drug War Chronicle
February 9, 2011The West Coast is a different world when it comes to progress on drug policy reform. Three of the four states most likely to see strong pushes for marijuana legalization in the next couple of years are on the West Coast (the other being Colorado). And medical marijuana is a fact of life from San Diego to Seattle. But it's not just pot politics that makes the West Coast different. The region has also been a pioneer in sentencing reform and harm reduction practices, even if countervailing forces remain strong and both policy areas remain contested terrain.
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Foreign potheads seek alternatives to Dutch coffee shop
AFPThe Independent (UK)
Sunday, February 6, 2011Learning to grow their own weed or finding a dealer: French and Belgian potheads are seeking alternatives to the famous Dutch coffee shop as The Hague plans to cut off drug tourists. Incensed by the "nuisance" caused by millions of people crossing its borders each year to visit one of 670 licensed coffee shops, the Netherlands plans to turn these cannabis-vending cafes into private clubs for card-carrying members - Dutch residents only.
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Injection drug facility coming to San Francisco?
San Francisco Chronicle (US)
Sunday, February 6, 2011A legal, city-funded center where intravenous drug users can get needles and shoot up without consequence is on the agenda in San Francisco. The idea comes from the city's Hepatitis C Task Force, created by then-Mayor Gavin Newsom in 2009 in response to growing concern over the 12,000 San Francisco residents infected by the disease, most of whom have no idea of their status. Opening the nation's first legal injection drug center garnered unanimous support by the task force.
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Wash. politician proposes selling pot in liquor stores
CTV British Columbia (Canada)
saturday, January 29, 2011A Washington State Democrat has introduced a bill to legalize marijuana and sell it in liquor stores. Rep. Mary Lou Dickerson filed House Bill 1550 on Tuesday, which proposes pot be sold to adults aged 21 and up. The bill argues regulation and taxation of weed would "generate revenue for health care programs" and "create jobs in the agricultural sector." It suggests the state's Liquor Control Board could issue licenses for marijuana growing.
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Press Conference by Bolivia on Amendment to Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs
Press Conference
New York, January 28, 2011Bolivia would continue its campaign to remove from a United Nations convention a ban on coca leaf chewing and take its case to the Economic and Social Council, if necessary, Pablo Solón, the country’s Permanent Representative said today at a Headquarters press conference.
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Coca-chewing Bolivians press for end to UN ban
AFP
Wednesday, January 26, 2011Bolivians chewed coca leaves in demonstrations around the country Wednesday to push for a change in a 1961 UN convention to remove a ban on a practice that has been part of indigenous cultures here for millennia. Protesters gathered outside the US embassy in La Paz to chew the leaf as part of a day of demonstrations around the country celebrating the coca plant and demanding that the UN Single Convention on Narcotics Drugs be amended.
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Time to push the reset button on the drug war
Inter-American Dialogue
Press Advisory
Wednesday, January 26, 2011Most Americans believe that their country’s forty-year “war on drugs” has failed. Yet, despite the costs and growing opposition to US antinarcotics strategy across Latin America, the US debate on drug policy remains muted. It is time now to end the silent tolerance of ineffective, socially harmful laws, institutions, and policies, and usher in a serious national discussion of how to reform US drug control strategies.
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Personalities urge new ways to tackle drug abuse
AFP
Tuesday, January 25, 2011A group set up by former Latin American leaders and personalities including Virgin chief Richard Branson on Monday recommended that consumers of illicit drugs should not be treated as criminals. The Global Commission on Drug Policies felt that the prevalent repressive approach to drug abuse was failing, members said after their two-day inaugural meeting.
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Bolivia launches coca leaf diplomatic offensive
BBC News (UK)
Friday, January 21, 2010Foreign Minister David Choquehuanca is on a European tour in a bid to drum up support for taking coca off a UN treaty on banned drugs. Spanish foreign minister Trinidad Jimenez told Mr Choquehuanca in Madrid that she "understood" Bolivia's demand and would try to mediate with other European countries thought to be considering an objection. Spain has already given its support to the Bolivian campaign. The US sent a letter to the United Nations saying it was opposed to the move.
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Let them chew coca
EditorialThe Economist (UK)
January 20, 2011The constraint on fresh thinking was on shameful display this week. A UN convention, reaffirmed in 2009, imposes a blanket prohibition on drugs. This includes even the traditional use of coca leaves by Andean Indians for chewing and tea. This ban has never been enforced and in 2009 Bolivia asked the UN to lift it—though not restrictions on coca cultivation for cocaine. With a deadline of the end of this month, America has lodged an objection and Britain looks poised to follow (see article). Traditional uses of coca are not addictive and are as much part of Andean culture as a cuppa is in Britain or beer in Texas. One reason for objecting seems to be that approval might open up a wider debate about legalising drugs.
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