Pubdate: Tue, 04 Jun 2013
Source: Tico Times, The (Costa Rica)
Copyright: 2013 Tico Times
Contact:  http://www.ticotimes.net/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/5333
Author: Isabel Sanchez

OAS: IS THE WAR ON DRUGS A FAILURE?

"No international entity is going to dictate legalization, and
certainly not to the United States," a top U.S. official says.

ANTIGUA, Guatemala -- Four decades after Washington launched its
international "war on drugs" in Latin America (the U.S. no longer uses
that term), members of the Organization of American States' General
Assembly are questioning the logic behind what is increasingly viewed
in the region as a failed policy.

In a General Assembly meeting that started Tuesday in the colonial
town of Antigua, Guatemala, OAS members will begin to explore
alternatives to a strategy focused on military and law enforcement
intervention to fight the trafficking of illegal drugs, mostly from
South America and destined for users in the United States.

The 45th session of the OAS General Assembly began Tuesday night,
drawing foreign ministers and three presidents from 34 countries
throughout the region, including the U.S., represented by Secretary of
State John Kerry and top-tier drug policy officials.

This month's session, which lasts through Thursday, will focus on
finding alternative strategies to the drug war, which has had a
devastating impact particularly on Mexico and northern Central
America, which have become the most violent region in the world.

"This is a long-awaited debate aE& to look for solutions to a
phenomenon that affects us all, although not equally," OAS Secretary
General Jose Miguel Insulza said. "The most vulnerable are the ones
who are paying the highest price in terms of violence."

Tens of thousands of Latin Americans have died in violence linked to
drug trafficking in past decades. Yet as the U.S.-backed policy in the
region focuses on law enforcement and cracking down on drug cartels,
the cartels simply change strategies, adopt more sophisticated
methods, alternate trafficking routes, open new markets and increase
money laundering operations -- despite large and frequent drug-seizure
operations, captures and extraditions conducted by police agencies and
governments.

Toward legalization?

Guatemalan President Otto Perez Molina, who called for legalization of
some illicit drugs to help curb the mounting violence in his country,
is hosting the summit. Costa Rica's Laura Chinchilla and the Dominican
Republic's Danilo Medina also will attend.

The debate is centered on an OAS report commissioned during the 2012
Summit of the Americas in Cartagena, Colombia, which called for an
analysis of alternative strategies to the drug war. The study outlined
four possible strategies to confront drug trafficking: strengthening
institutions and public security, decriminalizing illicit drugs,
promoting more community-based programs and terminating cooperation
between consuming and transit countries.

The proposal to legalize at illicit drugs such as marijuana and
cocaine is gaining momentum in the region. Marijuana already is legal
in the U.S. states of Colorado and Washington. Other states have
medical marijuana laws, in direct violation of U.S. federal law. And
the South American country of Uruguay is close behind, as are
Argentina and Brazil, which are considering decriminalizing personal
use.

At least 14 Latin American countries support debating new anti-drug
policies, including all of the countries of Central America, Uruguay,
Colombia and Mexico, Guatemalan Foreign Minister Fernando Carrera said.

Washington, in response, sent its big guns to this week's summit in
Guatemala. On his first official visit to Latin America, Kerry stood
behind current U.S. anti-drug policy in the region, according to U.S.
Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs Roberta
Jacobson.

"No international entity is going to dictate legalization, and
certainly not to the United States," Assistant Secretary of State for
the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs
William Brownfield said. Brownfield and Jacobson were joined in the
U.S. delegation by anti-drug czar Gil Kerlikowske.

But for Carrera, the taboo of drug policy already has been broken: "it
was thought that everything was outlined and the only thing left to do
was blindly apply a paradigm," he said.

Monster with seven heads

The OAS report approaches the issue from a public health perspective
instead of a public security one by focusing on prevention and
treatment programs.

According to the OAS, 45 percent of cocaine users worldwide, half of
heroin users and 25 percent of marijuana users live in the Americas,
the second most violent region behind Africa, with 16 homicides per
100,000 residents. That's double the world average.

The United Nations calculates that the illicit drug market generates
$85 billion annually in cocaine sales -- $35 billion of that in the
U.S. Those figures alter economies, corrupt institutions and result in
widespread violence, the U.N. stated.

"An illegal economy that reaches billions of dollars and is operated
by multinational criminal networks inevitably expands into illegal
weapons sales, contraband, piracy, human trafficking, prostitution,
kidnapping and extortion," Insulza said.

Civil society groups urged the OAS to place human rights at the center
of the debate.

"The national policies for drug control that allot criminal penalties
for personal drug consumption is a fundamental violation of human
rights," a Human Rights Watch press release stated. The group urged
governments to adopt policies of decriminalization for personal
consumption.
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MAP posted-by: Matt