Drug liberal ideas are gaining ground in Europe. But Sweden is seen as a symbol for the resistance against drug liberalism. Consequently the position of the Swedish government on drug issues is followed with great interest by both sides of the debate.

The lines of contention in the European narcotics debate are drawn between a liberal and a restrictive view of drug policy. Those who advocate the liberal position maintain that it is impossible to banish narcotics from society and that the most important thing is to reduce harm, for example by suppyling drug abusers with clean needles and hygenic injection rooms. And the drug liberal line has been making progress the last few years.

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The minister of justice is a drug liberal! Thats how the past weekends indignant judgements about Thomas Bodström read. The background is an article he wrote in Liberal Debatt No. 7/98. There Bodström criticized the Swedish drug policy.

Since 1988 possession of illegal drugs is criminal and since 1993 one can be sentenced to prison for possession. (Note, its consumption -- not possession). "No drug addict will stop abusing heroin because he risks being sentenced to prison for it", Bodström wrote. He meant that the criminalization of possession has not helped heavy drug abusers, but that it has meant that they have been excluded from society.

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There is a hard battle being fought in the European narcotics debate between the liberal and restrictive positions. Sweden has represented the strongest support for a restrictive policy. Because of this, Justice Minister Thomas Bodstroms position on drug issues is important. Already on his first working day he was forced to back away from a two year old debate article.

Minister of Justice Thomas Bodstrom no longer stands by his earlier criticism of the governments narcotics policy. Two years ago he called the criminalisation of drugs meaningless and opportunistic. Now he fully supports it.

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Indictments for drug possession have increased dramatically at the same time as indictments for drug dealing have halved.

This is shown by statistics from the years 1993-1997 that the National Council for Crime Prevention have studied, says radio of Sweden's Ekot.

The reason for the increase is believed to be the more stringent punishments for personal use of drugs seven years ago, the same time the police was given increased authority to take a drug test whenever there was a suspicion of a drug crime.

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Justice Minister Thomas Bodstrom, 38, has said that the use of drugs should be permitted. In an article in the journal 'Liberal Debatt' two years ago he wrote that the criminalisation of narcotics consumption was a completely meaningless reform.

Bodstrom has himself smoked hasch many times.

"The criminal policy against those who abuse narcotics is extremly harsh and the criminalisation of narcotics has not led to a reduction in abuse. On the contrary, the effect has been the social marginalisation of drug abusers."

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Questioning Swedish narcotics policy does not usually further ones political career. But now there is a remarkable exception.

The countrys new Minister of Justice is not only known for his raw tackles on the football field and his deep commitment to refugee issues. He is also an open critic of the changes in narcotics policy during the 1980's and the subsequent intensive repression of drug abusers.

In the periodical 'Liberal Debatt', nr 7/98 he wrote: "Sweden is conducting an extremely harsh criminal policy against those who abuse drugs. Consumption of narcotics has been illegal since 1988 and since 1993 has carried a prison sentence. Criminalisation has not resulted in a reduction in abuse and is more to be seen as a result of political opportunism.

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The Swedish drugs adviser, Borje Dahl, claims that the restrictive Swedish narcotics policy has succeeded in reducing the number of young people using drugs in the country to under 3% (Irish Examiner, September 6, 2000). His claim is not supported by the Swedish Government's own published figures.

According to that report the use of illegal drugs in Sweden is escalating out of control.

Drug use amongst young people has more than doubled during the 1990s, with 18% of young men now using drugs.

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SWEDISH drinkers are raising a glass to toast the European Union, following its refusal yesterday to drop demands to ease the Scandinavian country's draconian laws.

Every Friday evening, thousands throughout the country queue for up to an hour at State-owned Systembolaget alcohol stores to buy supplies for the weekend.

Inside, bottles of alcohol remain tantalisingly out of reach inside locked glass cabinets. Each is numbered. Customers give the numbers to staff, who get the drink from the back of the store.

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Docent Ted Goldberg: We must abandon the myth that all who experiment with narcotics become addicts.

In the past two decades Swedish drug policy has been geared to drive home the message that all non-medical use of narcotics constitutes abuse. In other words: All consumers are equal in this respect. Either reject all narcotics totally or you are an abuser. If a similar either/or attitude was transfered to alcohol it should mean that a glass of wine with dinner would make the drinker just as much an abuser as a down and out alcoholic.

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Against the background of yesterday's article about the drug habits of Stockholm's ninth grade pupils, Kristina Axen Olin, Member of the City Council's Social Affairs Board, tells SvD that there are plans to establish a drug center that, among other matters, shall create public opinion, educate teachers and distribute material to be used in the battle against alcohol and narcotic addiction.

"The rapid developments in this area are unbelievable. New drugs all the time. You hardly know their names, leave alone what they look like. Not even our lawmakers can handle it." The study of 15-year olds is deeply disturbing, she says. Many drink habitually great quantities of beer, wine or alcohol.

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STOCKHOLM, Feb 17 (Reuters) - Swedish customs authorities seized 243 kg (536 lb) of cocaine hidden in a banana container from Costa Rica, a record haul for the country with a street value of $126 million, officials said on Wednesday.

Inspectors in the western port of Gothenburg discovered the cocaine in an eight-centimetre (three-inch) deep space separated by a dummy wall in the container. The bananas were unloaded at Gothenburg, and normally such a container would have been sent back empty.

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The involvement of the police in narcotic prevention education appears to have little effect to change pupils attitudes to narcotics. That is the conclusion of a report from the Crime Prevention Council (BRA) which has investigated two of the educational programs, VAGA (a direct translation of DARE, translator's note) and the Rave Commission have designed as strategies to stave off drug use.

Criminal statistics shows that drug use among Swedish youths is on the increase. Material from annual investigations into the drug use habits of youths also point to an increased drug use according to BRA. In 1997 those suspected of drug crimes of the ages 15 to 19 years old increased to about 13% of the total cases investigated.

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400 of the county's 900 Gambians are involved in drug trade in Stockholm according to the Police.

The Drug trade in Stockholm is growing at an immense rate. County police commissioner, Leif Jennekvist, gave an alarming picture of the situation this Thursday. He points out the African nation Gambia to be responsible for as good as all of the heroin trade, he also revealed that Somaliska Foreningen (The Somalian Association) in Stockholm has pleaded to the prosecutors office to take immediate measures against the strong increase in the use of Khat. Khat is an amphetamine preparation that is chewed to the size of a golf ball and which is now flooding, not only Sweden, but also entire Europe. "Somaliska Foreningen doesn't want the Khat problem here in Sweden," Jennekvist says. They are scared for their fellow countrymen, and don't want Swedish youths to get in contact with the drug.

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Abuse increase in Sweden. The drug is on a decline in most EU-countries.

Vienna. The last year's drug of choice looses popularity among EU-citizens. On the other hand, however, there is an increase in amphetamines, which are probably going to be more important than ecstasy in the future. It is made clear by a report for 1998 from the EU's so called drug observatory in Lisbon. The report is published today, Friday, in Vienna. Sweden is one of few countries where consumption of ecstasy still is increasing. The Drug observatory's view on ecstasy has changed since the last year's report. At that time, in 1997, ecstasy was considered to be a futuristic drug, and its harmful effects were considered to be insignificant. Today a new knowledge is added. "More and more points to that many consumers of ecstasy, whom have taken the drug for many years, can be affected by irreversible damages on the nerve system," says Richard Hartnoll, director of the Drugcentre's epidemiological department. That knowledge seems to have reached the consumers as well. But a more important cause for ecstasy's decline is, according to Richard Hartnoll, that its no longer seems to be modern. "It was a part of a youth culture in Holland and Great Britain for ten years, but there is ecstasy considered to be just one of many drugs," he says. To countries like Sweden and Finland, ecstasy arrived much later, and one might assume that the decline will arrive there also, probably with a delay of a couple of years.

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Heroin trade. Preventive work and tougher measures are some of the proposals on how the growing heroin trade in Stockholm will be stopped. The Gambians responsible for the drug trade must be severely punished, says Rishala Njie, chairman in the Organization of Gambia. At the same time, Stockholm Police Commissions have to save 66 million Swedish crowns during 1999, something that among other things negatively affects the fight against the drug trade.

Friday was an extremely rough day for Rishala Njie, chairman of the Organization of Gambia in Stockholm. He awoke to yesterdays Dagens Nyheter's headlines about the drug trades avalanche-like development, and city police commissioner Leif Jennekvist's claims that Gambia is responsible for as good as the entire heroin trade in Stockholm. "I am ashamed," says Njie "What has now happened is devastating for my country and I am deeply sorry for the illegal drug trade which takes place in the area around Sergels torg." "I don't question the information from the police," Njie emphasize, who has been living in Sweden since 1978, father of two, and in the middle of a taxi-education of the employment office's direction.

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The increasingly solitary Swedish resistance is tempering the EU's liberalization moves to some degree. But several of the EU countries are now on a path to decrease or modify punishments for illegal drugs.

As recently as this spring the Attorney General of Belgium ordered police and prosecutors to cease prosecutions of cannabis use, posession or cultivation. The idea is that the lawenforcement resources instead shall be used to prosecute traffic in "heavy narcotics". At this moment, authorities in Liege - the third largest city in Belgium - are debating a plan to legally prescribe established heroin to users.

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(Brussels, SvD) Sweden's more and more lonesome opposition has at least stopped the EU from sliding towards a drugliberal stand. But several countries in europe are easing up on their drug laws. In Belgium the minister of justice commanded the police and attorneys to stop punishing the posession, use and cultivation of cannabis. The main idea is to concentrate policeforces to go after those involved with hard drugs. At this time the authorities are considering if, Liege, Belgiums third largest city, is going to be allowed to prescribe heroin to heavy addicts. It is already done since several years in the British city of Liverpool. As of last year, a campaign was launched in Great Britain to make cannabis and marijuana legal. The newspaper the Independent on Sunday has collected a lot of signatures, not the least from famous personalities, and two awards for civil courage in their campaign.

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A SCANDINAVIAN study has found 90% of all cot death babies have "significant" level of nicotine in their bloodstream.

The research, conducted by the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, also found a quarter of all victims had as much nicotine in their bodies as regular smokers.

The institute published the findings in the US Journal of Paediatrics. They offer the first direct link between tobacco and Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, long thought to be connected.

This was the first study of its kind to measure the nicotine levels in the bodies of infants who had died suddenly. It also offered the first scientific evidence parental smoking is linked directly to the cot death of children.

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STOCKHOLM---A 16-year ban on Saturday sales at Sweden's state-run alcohol shops could end if current Social Affairs Minister Margot Wallstrom has her way.

Despite images internationally of Sweden as a liberal, free-living country, the sale of alcohol is tightly controlled by the state to discourage excessive drinking, with all but lowalcohol beer available only from state shops, or Systembolagets.

The social affairs minister is campaigning to reopen alcohol shops Saturdays.

She said that the large amounts of alcohol smuggled into Sweden to beat high taxes and the increased consumption of home brew had defeated the purpose of the closure.

A survey in a National Railway Authority newspaper, Kupe, this summer found 68 percent of 1,000 Swedes questioned thought Systembolagets should open Saturdays.

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STOCKHOLM, Sweden (AP) - U.S. drug czar Barry McCaffrey on Monday praised Sweden's drug policies, saying they make far more sense than liberalized policies such as those in the Netherlands.

McCaffrey, who's beginning a European fact-finding tour, sparked Dutch ire last week by saying the country's policy of letting its citizens use marijuana and other soft drugs for therapeutic and recreational purposes was ``an unmitigated disaster.''

The trip comes as the U.S. government launches a $1 billion, five-year ad campaign aimed at steering young people away from trying drugs.

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