In March 2008, a two-year long 'period of global reflection' on the 1998 UN General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS) on the World Drug Problem started. What have been the results? What space was there be for civil society to participate in the different stages of the process? What were the key issues on the table? What kind of improvements in the functioning of the UN drug control system have been achieved?
The most recent UNGASS took place in 2016. To follow the preparations and proceedings check the International Drug Policy Consortium (IDPC) special webpage.
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Weed and the UN: Why international drug laws won't stop legalization
Cannabis is clearly the elephant in the room at UNGASS
Vice (US)
Wednesday, April 20, 2016Under the outcome document for UNGASS that was drafted by diplomats in Vienna and formally adopted at UN headquarters in New York, weed still remains strictly banned by the treaties that govern international law. The intransigence is a real problem that threatens to undermine the legitimacy of all types of international treaties. John Walsh, the senior associate for drug policy at the Washington Institute on Latin America (WOLA), is hosting one of two weed-focused "side events" scheduled at the UN. "Cannabis is clearly the elephant in the room at UNGASS," Walsh said. "It's there, it's huge, but no one wants to talk about it."
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To win the war on drugs, stop brutalising farmers who grow them
Reform of drug policy is essential to protect the rights of cultivating communities, and ensure they make a living from their land
Pien MetaalThe Guardian (UK)
Tuesday, April 19, 2016Reform of international drug control is urgently needed. The war on drugs has left a trail of suffering and criminality in its wake and has manifestly failed to achieve its objectives. The UN special session of the general assembly (UNGASS) presents an opportunity. Many reformers put drug users at the centre of changes to international drug policies, but the people growing the plants producing the substances they consume are often overlooked. Farmers’ livelihoods and communities are inherently linked to reform of international drug policies. For hundreds of thousands of farmers’ families, existing crop control laws and practices cause conflict and poverty. (See: Contributions of grower representatives at UNGASS)
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UN backs prohibitionist drug policies despite call for more 'humane solution'
Plan adopted at special session focuses on reform and cooperation between nations but maintains policies that criminalise non-medical or scientific drug use
The Guardian (UK)
Tuesday, April 19, 2016The 2016 UN General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS) has approved an agreement that leaves in place the prohibitionist policies banning narcotics use, despite growing international discontent with the "war on drugs" – and the concerns of the nations that called the meeting. "So far, the solutions [to control drugs and crime] implemented by the international community have been frankly insufficient," Mexican president Enrique Peña Nieto told the meeting. Within the General Assembly, the rift between countries interested in drug policy reform and those with repressive drug control regimes was evident.
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Ahead of a key meeting, Russia is driving global drug policy into the ground
The Russian government is out of step with the world on drug policy — and it’s working to perpetuate failed policies of the past
The Huffington Post (US)
Wednesday, April 13, 2016As the first major global meeting on drug policy in two decades approaches, Russia is quietly emerging as a powerful force working to perpetuate the war on drugs in the face of growing weariness with the quagmire worldwide. Later in April, the United Nations will convene a special session on drug policy aimed at shaping the global approach in the decades to come. Key nations convened last month in Vienna to move the negotiations forward ahead of the gathering, and Russia threw up roadblocks at every opportunity. (See also: Just Say Nyet | Russian drug policies fuel Europe’s worst HIV pidemic)
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Canada on drugs at the UN: Standing up for a long-overdue policy shift
Canada’s statement read like a checklist of progressive drug policy positions
The Hill Times (Canada)
Wednesday, April 13, 2016The applause persisted until the chair of the session eventually gavelled it to an end. The occasion? Canada’s statement at the UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND) in Vienna, where countries were negotiating the text of a declaration to be adopted at the UN General Assembly’s Special Session on drugs (UNGASS) in New York. Sadly, at the CND, a faction of states ensured that the document fails to respond to the current realities of the “the world drug problem.” Hence, it was important that Canada’s applause-worthy statement read like a checklist of progressive drug policy positions, reflecting many points Canadian civil society groups have been advocating for years.
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UNGASS 2016: Watershed event or wasted opportunity?
Drug policy changes collide with UN bureaucracy
Martin JelsmaTuesday, April 12, 2016At about two o'clock in the morning on March 23rd, after tense negotiations in Vienna, the UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND) reached a disappointing compromise. The hard-bargained draft of the outcome document of the UN General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS) on drugs taking place in New York from 19-21 April was adopted by ‘consensus’. Although its key features are by no means a surprise the draft is disappointing nonetheless.
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Illicit drugs are not the only problem
It’s outdated drug policy that needs fixing
Fernando Henrique CardosoThe Huffington Post (US)
Monday, April 11, 2016Next week the United Nations is convening the largest gathering on drug policy that the world has seen in two decades. It was the brainchild of three Latin American presidents — from Colombia, Guatemala and Mexico — who wanted to end decades of poorly conceived and executed counter-narcotics programs. Their hope was that the General Assembly Special Session, or UNGASS, would stimulate new thinking on ways to reverse the political, social and economic wreckage of a failed war on drugs.
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Panama Papers demonstrate need to reopen UNGASS 2016 outcome document
Recommendations to counter money laundering are inadequate
Tom BlickmanFriday, April 8, 2016The Panama Papers, a massive leak of confidential documents from Mossack Fonseca, a law firm in Panama that helped wealthy clients and money launderers for drug trafficking organisations set up anonymous shell companies in tax havens, should open the outcome document of the UN General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS 2016) on the world drug problem, that will take place on April 19-21 in New York.
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The UN’s war on drugs is a failure
Is it time for a different approach?
The Observer (UK)
Sunday, April 3, 2016A policy of prohibition has put the drugs trade in the hands of criminals and led to suffering for millions. 2008 was the year that the world didn’t eliminate the illicit drugs problem. This quixotic goal had been set a decade earlier at a United Nations general assembly special session when, under the vainglorious slogan “We can do it”, the supranational body pledged that, by 2008, the world would be “drug free”. As the UN prepares to host another special session on drugs in New York, the failure of the 1998 assembly to realise the goal is recorded in the vast amounts of money, resources, time and blood that have been expended in pursuing the apparently impossible.
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TNI at CND 2016: reports from Vienna
Agreeing on an outcome document to be approved by the UN General Assembly at the 2016 UNGASS
The Transnational Institute (TNI) attended the 59th session of the UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs in Vienna from the 14-22nd March. The CND negotiated the outcome document to be approved at the 2016 UNGASS on the world drug problem, to be held on April 19-21 in New York. This storify features tweets, blogs and news from the event. (See also: The UNGASS outcome document: Diplomacy or denialism?)
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