U.N.’s head of anti-drug trafficking warns against legalization
This article was originally on a blog post platform and may be missing photos, graphics or links. See About archive blog posts.
‘In the Americas, the biggest threat to public safety comes from drug trafficking and the violence perpetuated by organized crime,’ said Antonio Maria Costa, executive director of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) speaking in Mexico City yesterday.
‘Urban violence in the U.S., biker gangs in Canada, violence and kidnapping in Mexico, pandillas and maras in Central America, thugs in the Caribbean, gangs in Brazilian shanty towns, insurgency in Colombia -- in every case there is a connection to drugs,’ Costa said.
He urged governments not to be tempted to legalize drugs such as cocaine and methamphetamine, saying: ‘At this point, we know what some people -- the pro-drug lobby, for example -- would say: ‘Legalize drugs and crime will disappear.’ In other words, while facing an undeniably tough problem, we are invited to accept it, hide our head in the sand and make it legal.
‘I do not agree, and let me explain why by using an analogy. Human trafficking is another tough crime problem, worldwide -- perhaps second in size, after drug trafficking. Should we legalize modern slavery, given the intrinsic difficulty in dealing with it? Of course not.’
Instead, he called for more to be done across the hemisphere to tackle the problem from the demand and supply end, working more towards reducing the cultivation, processing and trafficking of drugs.
He added: ‘Until the number of cocaine users falls worldwide, the problems caused by narco-trafficking will be displaced (as we are now seeing in West Africa) rather than solved. Therefore, more attention and resources must be devoted to drug prevention and treatment. Demand and supply reduction measures will inevitably contain the trafficking problem and the crimes associated to it.’
Mexico is currently in the grip of surging levels of drug-related violence. President Felipe Calderon has sent 40,000 soldiers and 5,000 federal police officers to secure large swaths of the country against its powerful drug cartels. In the nearly two years since Calderon launched a crackdown against drug gangs, more than 4,000 people have died.
Read more about Mexico’s drug war here at our ‘Mexico Under Siege’ page.
-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City