From: Colombian Labor Monitor <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: Wed, 4 Jul 2001 18:55:29 -0500 (CDT)
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: THE GUARDIAN: Ex-envoy to Colombia says legalise drugs
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COLOMBIAN LABOR MONITOR
www.prairienet.org/clm
Wednesday, 4 July 2001
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* THE GUARDIAN [London] *
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1. THE GUARDIAN [London] -- Wednesday, 4 July 2001
EDITORIAL
A hardliner repents: The international war on drugs is lost
2. THE GUARDIAN [London] -- Wednesday, 4 July 2001
COMMENTARY
This war is unwinnable
By Keith Morris
3. THE GUARDIAN [London] -- Wednesday, 4 July 2001
Ex-envoy to Colombia says legalise drugs
By Owen Bowcott
4. THE GUARDIAN [London] -- Wednesday, 4 July 2001
Counting costs of illegal trade
By Owen Bowcott
5. THE GUARDIAN [London] -- Wednesday, 4 July 2001
Pitfalls to lifting drugs prohibition
By Owen Bowcott
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* 1 *
THE GUARDIAN [London]
Wednesday, 4 July 2001
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* EDITORIAL *
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A hardliner repents:
The international war on drugs is lost
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Ten years ago Sir Keith Morris, the British ambassador to Colombia, was a
firm believer in the war on drugs being waged by the US with the support
of Europe against the drug barons of Latin America. Ten years on he has
concluded the war, which still continues, "is unwinnable, costly and
counter-productive". In his article (opposite) today, he describes the
devastating effects which the drug war has had on Colombian society, but
also recognises the cultural change which has taken place towards
recreational drugs in the developed world. He wants a new debate about how
drugs could be controlled more effectively within a legal framework. More
controversially, he rules out decriminalisation as "an unsatisfactory
halfway house because it would leave the trade in criminal hands, give no
help at all to the producer countries, and would not guarantee consumers a
safe product or free them from the pressure of pushers".
The debate which Sir Keith wants to spark will be welcomed by many people
in the drug treatment world. The international war against drugs has
always been as doomed to failure as the domestic war played out on British
streets. The criminal syndicates are too well dug-in, the profits too
enticing, and the demand from consumers too widespread for effective
criminal sanctions.
More serious still, even if President Bush's father had succeeded in
ending the Colombian drug trade, that would not have resolved the problem.
Given the resources available to the multi-billion pound criminal
industry, it would not have taken the traffickers long to produce some
synthetic substitute. As Ben Whittaker noted in his book The Global Fix
over a decade ago: "We can no more hope to end drug abuse by eliminating
heroin and cocaine than we could alter the suicide rate by outlawing high
buildings or the sale of rope."
Sir Keith would like to explore some form of legalisation. There are
strong arguments, which rightwing journals such as the Economist and
Sunday Telegraph were pushing as long ago as 1988: the failure of
successive wars on drugs over 20 years; the criminalisation of young
people; the contamination of drugs which unregulated trade by the criminal
underworld allows; as well as an increase in crime by users needing to pay
high prices for an illegal product. Legalisation would improve the purity
of the products and offer the chance of taxing the producers to provide
more resources for treatment.
But there are equally strong arguments against. Legalisation would
increase addiction, offer fewer incentives to stop taking drugs, and
multiply the damage that is already being wreaked. Remember, many addicts
want to stop. The harm which crack, cocaine and LSD cause is serious.
Moreover, addicts are not just hurting themselves, but others too: in road
accidents, passing on the habit to others, loss of family income. There
are also serious problems raised by international law. As a signatory to
international treaties dating back to 1920 but including three separate UN
conventions (1961, 1971, 1988), the UK is obliged to make trafficking a
criminal offence. Moreover, legalising hard drugs, would not stop criminal
syndicates producing alternative illegal substitutes.
Yet, as the Police Foundation's independent inquiry into our outdated
current laws noted last year, international law allows considerable leeway
on how domestic law deals with users. This is where the debate could
begin. The government's response to last year's Runciman report was
pathetic, rejecting 24 of her recommendations. But that was before an
election. Viscountess Runciman's report, which reordered the
classification of drugs by modern analysis of their harmfulness, would be
a useful starting point. It could move on to make the possession of
certain drugs - cannabis for a start - legal. The current lord chief
justice floated just such an approach in 1993. It is time the debate
began.
Copyright 2001 Guardian Newspapers Limited
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* 2 *
THE GUARDIAN [London]
Wednesday, 4 July 2001
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* COMMENTARY *
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This war is unwinnable
----------------------
By Keith Morris
November 1992, European Drugs Week: Panorama opened with seven minutes of
Kenneth Clarke, the then home secretary, jumping out of helicopters to
look at coca growing in the jungle and opium poppy being sprayed in the
High Andes. Behind him there hovered, to the embarrassment of my children,
a white-haired ambassador with a stick. Thus started what the Colombians
came to call "narcotourism". The chatter of the Colombian anti-narcotics
police helicopters, with their machine guns at the ready and columns of
smoke from burning mountains of cocaine, were used to show that the war on
drugs was no metaphor.
When I accompanied Clarke that day, I believed there was a point to that
war. In the years since, I have come to realise that the war is
unwinnable, costly and counter-productive.
I was appointed ambassador to Colombia in 1990 knowing I had much to learn
about the drugs trade. The Colombia I returned to 20 years after my first
posting there had changed greatly, mostly for the better, with steady
growth and substantial spending on education and health. Along with the
end of the cold war, this should have helped bring about a negotiated end
to the low intensity communist insurgency that had plagued the country
from the mid-60s. But instead of peace, Colombia saw a dramatic increase
in violence and corruption as prohibition made cocaine a profitable
commodity. Slumbering Marxist guerrillas prospered on the money the drug
traffickers paid them to protect the cocaine laboratories. The traffickers
also hired assassins to kill and intimidate, and paramilitaries to defend
their ranches from the very guerrillas to whom they were paying protection
money.
Under US pressure, the Colombians extradited drug traffickers to the US.
In retaliation Pablo Escobar, then the world's seventh-richest man
according to Forbes, launched a campaign of narcoterrorism. In one year,
from August 1989, his assassins killed three presidential candidates, blew
up an airliner with more than 100 passengers, set off dozens of car bombs
and killed 200 policemen in Medellin alone.
So as I arrived in Colombia, the war on drugs seemed like self-defence.
The US, the UK and other Europeans had just started to give help in
training and equipment to the Colombians to counter the direct threat to
the state that Escobar represented. It was meant to be part of a deal: as
well as helping tackle supply we - the consumer countries - would crack
down on the supply of precursor chemicals, check money laundering and
reduce demand at home. At the time, we really believed that the war was
winnable.
Some progress was made. The Colombian police responded well to help and
advice. Escobar gave himself up when the threat of extradition was
dropped. He escaped a year later but his organisation was demolished and
in December 1993 he was killed. But the Americans immediately started
briefing that Escobar had long been a sideshow and that the real problem
was the Cali cartel. After so much effort and many lives lost, the trade
was still as great as ever. I began to wonder about the chances of success
and also about the obsessive attitudes of our leading ally.
My concerns were justified. US policy on Colombia came to be dominated by
drugs. Two days after President Samper was elected in 1994, he was accused
of having accepted Dollars 5m from the Cali cartel to finance his
campaign. US agencies had allegedly been involved in taping conversations.
The American line when I left Colombia in late 1994 was that Samper would
be judged on his performance against the traffickers. The Cali cartel was
dismembered by mid-1995, but when members of Samper's own campaign, who
were under investigation, implicated him in the drugs scandal, the US
administration imposed sanctions, undermining confidence in what had been
South America's most stable economy.
Morale in Colombia's overstretched armed forces was undermined as they saw
their president attacked by their great ally. The only beneficiaries were
the Marxist guerrillas and their rightwing mirror image, the
paramilitaries. Ironically, it is only recently that the US has started to
take the threat of communism in Colombia seriously again, and has taken
steps to strengthen the army. But it isn't ideology that fuels Colombia's
violence: it is the money from the illegal drugs trade.
Colombia has now been involved in anti-narcotics efforts under US pressure
for 30 years: against marijuana in the 70s, cocaine in the 80s and 90s,
and heroin in the 90s. And for the past 12 years there has been intense
international cooperation. But as General Serrano, the highly respected
former commander of the Colombian police told me in March, in spite of all
that the flow of drugs has increased. The cost: tens of thousands dead,
more than a million displaced people, political and economic stability
undermined and the country's image ruined.
The attack on the supply side of the drugs trade was always bound to fail
if the other elements - precursor chemicals, money laundering and demand -
were not tackled too. But there seems to be no shortage of chemicals
reaching the traffickers; there have been no striking results on stopping
money flows; and demand has grown, with the habit now spreading to the
producer countries too. There has been a cultural change which has led to
the recreational use of drugs being seen by the younger generation as
normal. It is now part of a global consumer society that demands instant
gratification. Laws cannot change that. All they can do is create a
Dollars 500bn criminal industry with devastating effects worldwide. It
must be time to start discussing how drugs could be controlled more
effectively within a legal framework.
Decriminalisation, which is often mentioned, would be an unsatisfactory
halfway house, because it would leave the trade in criminal hands, giving
no help at all to the producer countries, and would not guarantee
consumers a safe product or free them from the pressure of pushers. It has
been difficult for me to advocate legalisation because it means saying to
those with whom I worked, and to the relatives of those who died, that
this was an unnecessary war. But the imperative must be to try to stop the
damage.
Some politicians have religious objections to any attempt at legalisation.
Others still believe that if we persevere the war can be won; and there
are many who will tell you in private that we are getting nowhere but
believe that the electorate and certainly Washington would never buy
radical change. I am not so sure. The younger generation views things
differently and what is politically impossible today can become
politically imperative tomorrow. I hope this government will at least
agree to a serious debate on the subject. It deserves it.
Copyright 2001 Guardian Newspapers Limited
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* 3 *
THE GUARDIAN [London]
Wednesday, 4 July 2001
Ex-envoy to Colombia says legalise drugs
----------------------------------------
By Owen Bowcott
Britain's former ambassador to Colombia, who has witnessed at close
quarters the spiralling cost of the war against cocaine and been at the
heart of international initiatives to counter trafficking, yesterday
called for legalisation of drugs.
Sir Keith Morris, who served in Bogota from 1990-94, argues in a Guardian
article that the drugs war "is unwinnable, costly and counter-productive".
He urges an end to prohibition and the establishment of a controlled,
legal framework in which drug sales would be taxed for the common good.
The founder chairman of the British and Colombian chamber of commerce, he
maintains contacts with Latin America, where governments have for years
urged the west to help their drug-distorted economies by reducing the
demand for illicit drugs.
He has also been privy to senior UK government thinking. While in Bogota
he hosted visits from then home secretaries Kenneth Clarke and Michael
Howard, and the then prime minister John Major.
Sir Keith's comments coincide with signs of a possible softening in
official policy on drugs and a flurry of debate on the issue since the
election. Last Sunday, Mo Mowlam, the former cabinet office minister who
visited Colombia several times as the minister heading the war against
drugs, urged decriminalisation of cannabis.
"This government believes in 'what works': drugs prohibition does not
work," Sir Keith, 66 and now retired, said yesterday. "I'm encouraged that
the government has started to relax the regime for cannabis.
"Now the principle of prohibition has in practice been abandoned, I hope
the government will start a serious examination of the best way of
controlling drug use within a legal framework. It will not be easy. Hard
drugs users may have to register with GPs and get their drugs on
prescription.
"Some soft drugs might be sold under a regime like that used for alcohol
and tobacco and, as Mo Mowlam has proposed for cannabis, they would be
tested for purity and taxed.
"The revenue would go to medical research and greatly improve education
and treatment. There will be costs, probably, initially at least, greater
use and addiction and problems quite unforeseen. But the benefits to life,
health and liberty of drug users and the life, health and property of the
whole population would be immense."
Sir Keith admits advocating legalisation has been personally difficult
"because it means saying to those with whom I worked and to the relatives
of those who died that this was an unnecessary war".
By coincidence, the police in Brixton, south London, chose this week to
announce they will simply warn those caught in possession of small
quantities of cannabis. In effect, they have turned their attention to
more serious crimes.
In her column in the Sunday Mirror, Ms Mowlam wrote: "From my time (of
being) con cerned (with) the government's drug policy I have come to the
conclusion that we must decriminalise cannabis. The trade needs to be
legalised so it can be sensibly regulated.
"We could then have a tested product, which would be safer; outlets where
other more dangerous drugs were not also available and it could be taxed."
Any income, she suggested, would pay for improved treatment of addicts.
Since Ms Mowlam retired from parliament at the election, responsibility
for government drug strategies has passed from the cabinet office to the
Home Office.
Arguments for legalisation have more commonly come from the libertarian
wing of the Conservative party. Last year, for example, the former Tory
treasury minister, Philip Oppenheim, similarly warned "criminalising drugs
hands massive profits to organised crime". Drugs are dangerous, he
conceded, but "legalisation looks like the lesser evil".
Copyright 2001 Guardian Newspapers Limited
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* 4 *
THE GUARDIAN [London]
Wednesday, 4 July 2001
Counting costs of illegal trade
-------------------------------
By Owen Bowcott
The cost of maintaining the war on drugs is impossible to calculate
precisely. Its victims may be counted in terms of distorted economies in
the developing world, the hundreds of thousands imprisoned and the
murders, street robberies and break-ins perpetrated by desperate,
cash-strapped addicts.
The crudest estimates suggest the global illegal drugs market is worth
pounds 300bn a year and rising. That is equivalent to almost 8% of
international trade and makes it one of the largest commodities traded
after oil and arms. Most revenue falls into the pockets of organised
crime. The illegal drug trade in Britain is estimated to be worth pounds
10bn-pounds 20bn a year.
In Colombia, illicit cocaine and heroin production is blamed for
perpetuating a civil war which has cost 50,000 lives over the past 20
years. Local drug cartels build private submarines to smuggle their wares
under the Caribbean to the US. Impoverished nations, such as Haiti, lying
across such major trafficking routes, find their attempts to restart their
tourist industry undermined.
In the US, there are 2m people in prison of whom a quarter are in for
drug-related offences. The UK had 50,000 people in jail in 1999, of whom
8,000 were serving sentences for purely drugs offences.
Driving drugs underground has added to health problems. The World Health
Organisation estimates that 40% of recent Aids cases have been caused by
sharing injecting equipment.
In the UK a similar problem has spread hepatitis C, which can cause liver
cancer. It is feared 300,000 people are infected.
Copyright 2001 Guardian Newspapers Limited
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* 5 *
THE GUARDIAN [London]
Wednesday, 4 July 2001
Pitfalls to lifting drugs prohibition
-------------------------------------
By Owen Bowcott
Ending prohibition has been politically unthinkable for so long that few
politicians have contemplated what licensing framework or health
safeguards would be required to legalise different classes of controlled
drugs.
But amid signs that a public debate is beginning - Sir Keith Morris,
former British ambassador to Colombia calls in the Guardian today for
cocaine to be legalised - organisations are putting forward proposals for
alternative regimes.
The problems are legion. Who would sell the drugs and how? Should there,
for example, be more stringent testing to prevent pilots flying after
taking cocaine? Would additional checks be needed to detect drug users
driving under the influence of hallucinogens?
Inevitably, in a world committed to stamping out the drugs trade, the
situation would become more complicated if Britain were alone in
attempting to decriminalise or legalise drugs.
The Netherlands, which has permitted the sale of cannabis since 1976, has
recently experienced an even greater influx of drug buying by people
crossing over from neighbouring Germany at the weekend.
Earlier this summer Dutch officials unveiled plans to open two licensed
drive-through coffee shops selling to tourists on the outskirts of the
border town of Venlo: all of the Netherlands' 1,500 coffee shops have been
selling their soft drugs to hemp fans with time on their hands.
Transform, a Bristol organisation leading the campaign for drug
legalisation, accepts the need for change "within a regulated control
framework". Different drugs, it says, would require different regimes; the
more dangerous the drug, the more controlled the outlet.
Steve Rolles, campaign coordinator for Transform, said: "There are various
models in place already. There's licensed retailing in pubs or
tobaccanists which enforce age restrictions, there are over-the-counter
sales by trained pharmacists who give health advice, and there are
doctors' prescriptions.
"Something like heroin or cocaine might be available on prescription.
Heroin is already a legal medical drug, and regulatory frameworks exist
for licensed drugs and medicines which allow control over production,
price, quality and packaging. Is there any benefit to giving monopoly
control of this lucrative, dangerous market to organised crime and
unregulated dealers?"
Providing drugs education would be necessary. "Taboos around illegal drugs
have meant education programmes have been misleading and ineffective. An
expansion of drugs in formation services with a more balanced approach
could address the shortcomings."
Britain is a signatory to the 1988 United Nations' conventions against
illicit traffic in narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances, Mr Rolles
pointed out. This treaty limits the potential for legalising certain
chemicals, and though there is leeway for relaxation, the convention may
have to be challenged.
The treaty requires countries to make possession, purchase or cultivation
of illicit drugs for personal consumption a criminal offence, but it does
not specify the penalty. Many countries have found room for manoeuvre
within the convention. In Italy it is not a criminal offence to share
drugs with others with no payment involved.
In terms of controlling anti-social behaviour, British traffic laws
already make it illegal to drive "when unfit through drink or drugs".
According to the Home Office, there were 92,486 successful prosecutions in
1999; of those, only 1,800 were against drivers found to be unfit through
drugs.
The question of who profits would also have to be addressed. If drugs
earnings were taxed, would the government earmark the income for the
health service? Could producers advertise? Should there be tighter
restrictions than those imposed on advertising tobacco and alcohol
products?
Release, the drugs advice charity, has long advocated a royal commission
to examine drugs laws. "There couldn't be a legislative shift until the
population at large appreciate that someone who is on heroin, for example,
should not be scapegoated," said Grainne Whalley, of the charity.
Last year, the Runciman committee examined the case for overhauling the
main instrument for control, the 1971 Misuse of Drugs Act. Among the
committee's 80 recommendations were proposals to move cannabis from
category B to C, making possession a non arrestable offence. It also
suggested ecstasy should drop a category, from being a class A drug, to a
class B. It recommended neither decriminalisation nor legalisation.
Australia showed how hard it is to shift opinion. This year its first
legal heroin-injecting room, the largest "shooting gallery" in the world,
opened in Sydney's red-light district. This 18-month trial hopes to cut
drug overdose deaths, which soared from six in 1964 to 958 in 1999. But
the scheme took two years to establish and had to overcome criticism from
both the Australian prime minister and the Pope.
Copyright 2001 Guardian Newspapers Limited
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