The Drug War Wall Begins to Fall

Over the past week a number of news stories have surfaced in different corners of the globe that are flowing like tributaries into a mighty river of reform:

In Washington, the White House announced that DEA raids in medical marijuana states will end.

In Vienna, as Narco News copublisher Nora Callahan reports today, the US delegation to United Nations drug policy talks broke with Bush administration blocks placed on key reforms to the international drug war: the lifting of the 1988 ban on needle exchange programs in the United States requires a change in UN policy under treaties already signed. “The US will support and endorse needle exchange programs” for addicts to reduce the spread of AIDS and other communicable diseases, reports BBC radio.

In Rio de Janeiro, former presidents César Gaviria of Colombia, Ernesto Zedillo of Mexico and Fernando Enrique Cardoso of Brazil – all heads of state that had presided over prohibitionist policies in their lands – issued a joint report together with various Latin American intellectuals: Drugs and Democracy: Toward a Paradigm Shift.

Calling current drug policies “a failed war,” the former presidents concluded:

“…it is imperative to rectify the “war on drugs” strategy pursued in the region over the past 30 years.

“Prohibitionist policies based on the eradication of production and on the disruption of drug flows as well as on the criminalization of consumption have not yielded the expected results…

“Current drug repression policies are firmly rooted in prejudices, fears and ideological visions. The whole issue has become taboo which inhibits public debate. The association of drugs with crime blocks the circulation of information and segregates drug users in closed circles where they become even more exposed to organized crime.

“Hence, breaking the taboo and acknowledging the failure of current policies and their consequences is the inescapable prerequisite for opening up the discussion about a new paradigm leading to safer, more efficient and humane drug policies…”