La Presidencia de Alemania está preparando una nueva estrategia sobre drogas para la UE

Se producen reconsideraciones a partir de un amplio clamor respecto a la postergación de enfoques de salud pública y derechos humanos, y de la participación de la sociedad civil. Más información, en inglés, está disponible abajo.

By Péter Sárosi - Drugreporter

The new security-focused EU Drugs Agenda proposed by the EU Commission was criticised by civil society and member states. The German EU presidency is now in charge of revising it.

It was revealed at the online annual plenary meeting of the Civil Society Forum on Drugs that Member States did not accept the new EU Drugs Agenda proposed by the EU Commission. The Horizontal Working Party on Drugs (HDG) decided that a new EU strategy will be prepared by the German presidency.

In a previous article we made some critical remarks about the new EU Drugs Agenda presented by the EU Commission. We concluded that this document 1) contains a war on drugs language and posits drug use on par with child abuse and arms trafficking; 2) does not reflect the findings of the evaluation of the previous strategy that show the a need to refocus resources on public health rather than law enforcement; 3) unlike the previous action plan, this does not have measurable indicators and 4) civil society was not involved appropriately in the process.

Later in August the International Drug Policy Consortium (IDPC) sent an open letter to the members of the HDG. This letter called member states to reject the EU Drugs Agenda and prepare a new document that reflects the position of the EU presented at the UN meetings, that is, a shift from the traditional supply reduction focus to a new paradigm based on human rights, development and public health.