UN Drug Report Shows Shift to New Drugs, Markets

The 2010 United Nations World Drug Report, issued at a June 23 Newsmaker press conference, shows a "shift toward new drugs and new markets," according to Antonio Maria Costa, executive director of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime.

Costa said that while drug cultivation is declining in Afghanistan (for opium) and the Andean countries (coca),and has "stabilized" in the developed world, "there are signs of an increase in drug use in developing countries, and growing use of amphetamine-type stimulants and prescription drugs around the world."

The director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy,Gil Kerlikowske, said international cooperation in combating the drug problem "has never been better," and singled out Mexican President Felipe Calderon and recently elected Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos for praise. Calderon, Kerlikowske said, has shown "incredible courage" in taking on this problem.

Kerlikowske said legalization as a way of reducing drug addiction "is not the answer, under any circumstances." The former Seattle police chief also said he favors treatment of drug addicts over incarceration because it is just as effective and at half the cost.

One reason for the drug violence in Mexico, Costa said, is that "cartels are fighting over a shrinking market. This in-fight is a blessing for America, as the resulting cocaine drought is causing lower addiction rates, higher prices and lesser purity of doses."

The head of the Federal Service of the Russian Federation for Narcotics Traffic Control, Viktor Ivanov, said Russian President Dmitri Medvedev, who met with President Obama June 24, is cautiously optimistic about his country's success in the war on drugs, including cooperation with the U.S. In a reference to overall U.S.-Russian relations, Ivanov said the drug threat "should not be politicized."

Ivanov said the Russian government is working closely with regional and local authorities in determining "how we can best go after traffickers and reduce drug dependency in the Russian Federation."

Costa called for increased law enforcement to deal with drug trafficking.

"Unless we deal effectively with the threat posed by organized crime, our societies will be held hostage," he said, "and drug control will be jeopardized by renewed calls to dump the UN drug conventions critics say are the causes of crime and instability.

"This would undo the progress that has been made in drug control over the past decade, and unleash a pblic health disaster," he said. "Yet, unless drug prevention and treatment are taken more seriously, public opinion's support to the UN drug conventions will wane."

-- Peter Hickman, [email protected]