Thursday, June 2, 2011

Vargas Llosa, Carlos Fuentes and other persons asking to legalize cannabis

A committee formed by former Latin American presidents and other personalities such as writers Carlos Fuentes and Mario Vargas Llosa called for legalizing certain drugs such as cannabis and to fight drug trafficking, through a report released Wednesday. "Fifty years after the start of the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs (1961) and forty since President (Richard) Nixon launched by the U.S.

government's global war against drugs, there is urgent fundamental reforms global and national policies of control, "said former Brazilian President Fernando Henrique Cardoso. "Let's start, he added, treating drug addiction as a health issue, reducing demand for drugs through education initiatives and proven, rather than criminalize, regulate the cannabis legally." Former Brazilian president named chairman of the global commission on drug policy that values responsible for the report of "failed" policies carried out so far in many countries, such as the criminalization of drug users, producers and small traders.

"We can no longer ignore the violence, crime and corruption in Latin America for the drug are the result of the failure of policies to combat it," he said on his part the former president of Colombia, Cesar Gaviria, also a member of the commission. "Now is the time to break the taboo and discuss other policy options, including alternatives to drug prohibition," said Gaviria.

Along with Fuentes, Vargas Llosa, Cardoso and Gaviria, the committee responsible for the report consists of 15 other members, such as former President of Mexico, Ernesto Zedillo, former UN secretary general, Kofi Annan, the founder of Virgin Group Richard Branson, former High Commissioner for UN Human Rights, Louise Arbour, former representative of Foreign Affairs of the European Union, Javier Solana, and former president of the U.S.

Federal Pre-Order, Paul Volcker. The document, the first such high performing individuals, has several recommendations. On the one hand, calls for "review" the international list of banned drugs has been "obvious abnormalities were categorized as failure to cannabis, coca leaf and ecstasy." On the other hand, it is left to criminalize and stigmatize drug addicts and drug growers, drug dealers or small scale.

"Many are the victims of violence and intimidation or are drug addicts." "Arresting and jailing tens of millions of them in recent decades have led to fill the prisons and have destroyed lives and families without having reduced the supply of illicit drugs and the power of criminal organizations." In this sense, the document points to several countries such as Portugal forward, who after his policy of "decriminalization" conducted from July 2001 to those who consume or possess any type of drug, there was an increase in consumption.

It also gives an example of Holland or Australia. Among other recommendations, the report calls for investment in prevention programs for youth education, "avoiding simplistic messages like 'just say no' or 'zero tolerance'."

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