Pubdate: Wed, 06 Jan 2016
Source: Ottawa Citizen (CN ON)
Copyright: 2016 Postmedia Network Inc.
Contact:  http://www.ottawacitizen.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/326
Author: Mike Blanchfield
Page: C2

LEGALIZING POT GOES AGAINST 3 TREATIES

The Liberal government will have to do substantial work on the
international stage before it can follow through on Prime Minister
Justin Trudeau's promise to legalize marijuana, new documents suggest.

That work will have to include figuring out how Canada would comply
with three international treaties to which the country is a party, all
of which criminalize the possession and production of marijuana.

Trudeau's plan to legalize, regulate and restrict access to marijuana
is proving a complicated and controversial undertaking on the domestic
front, in part because it requires working with the provinces.

Internationally, says a briefing note prepared for the prime minister,
Canada will also have to find a way to essentially tell the world how
it plans to conform to its treaty obligations.

The note to Trudeau was obtained by The Canadian Press through the
Access to Information Act.

Errol Mendes, a constitutional and international law expert at the
University of Ottawa, says the government faces a long, hard slog in
the global arena before it can legalize pot at home.

Legalization, he said, is a growing movement among some countries,
particularly in Latin America, but it faces stiff opposition in the
United States - including within some quarters of the Obama
administration.

If the Republicans win the White House in November, the opposition
will be even stronger in a country where some see legalizing pot "as
the thin edge of the wedge," Mendes said.
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MAP posted-by: Matt