FOR THE INTERVENTION OF THE LAW-ABIDING STATE: LEGALISE AND CONTROL THE DRUGS TO FIGHT AGAINST THEM MORE EFFECTIVELY

APPEAL TO THE PARLIAMENT OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION

The many-years prohibition of drugs has proved its incapacity to solve the problem: stifle the drug trade and protect the health of the people from drug addiction.

Thanks to the washing of tainted money and the corruption it generates, the prohibitionism, i.e., the policy of banning the drugs, just favoured the growth of the power of narcomafia, a great menace to democracy and security in the whole world.

By prohibiting the drugs the state reached a deadlock. In fact, by taking an extremely bellicose position it dooms itself to feebleness.

The prohibitionism deprives the state of the means it uses for performing its mediatory duties, the duties of public control and guarantor of rights. The aim of the state is to cut down the enormous profits that attract the manufacturers and the drugs sellers. Besides, it is necessary to take certain measures in order to reduce the negative consequences of illegal drug consumption, to improve the public health service and to guarantee the drug-addicts the right to cure.

The point is that many citizens the state should take care of, especially the youngest and those socially and psychologically unprotected, are real victims of prohibitionism. The war against drugs turned into the war against drug addicts.

Now in Russia ordinary consumers of cannabis spend many months in prison. This turns over their whole life. They leave the prison disappointed with life and embittered against the society that allows such an injustice. They often start to consume another drug, heroin, that they discover in prison, or enter the world of crime.

The fact that Russian prohibitionist laws do not make any difference between light and heavy drugs (for instance, heroin) urges the people to pass from consuming cannabis just to "feel dispelled" to a heroin drug addiction.

In this sphere the experience of tolerance, manifested by Holland for 20 years towards the consumers of cannabis, is of great interest. In Holland the state organised a net of controlled distribution of cannabis through "coffeshops". As a result, the drug consumption did not grow and the medical problems concerning drug addiction diminished.

We can no longer agree with the laws that doom our fellow-citizens, especially the youngest ones, to a criminal future just because when they buy drugs, they have to go to dishonest mafia drug sellers that exploit them without scruple. Such laws are criminal by themselves and they favour criminality.

The question is not to promote the spreading of drugs, but to provide the state with the tools necessary for controlling this social phenomenon, characterised by constantly growing scope and heaviness.

We appeal to the Deputies of the State Duma and the Members of the Council of Federation to make without delay a decision to legalise drugs and establish an effective control of them.

Our main objectives include:

- legalisation of manufacturing, selling and consumption of cannabis and its derivatives, setting for these substances the same rules as we have for tobacco and alcohol;

- abolishing of the criminal and administrative responsibility for the simple use and keeping any drug for personal use;

- providing therapeutic freedom and the rights of drug-addicts to cure, including the possibility to use methadone and heroin prescribed by physician for medical purposes;

- revision of the UN conventions for drugs (1960, 1981 and 1988) to make possible the transition of the member-states of the UN to a less repressive policy for drugs, in particular, abolishing criminal responsibility for drug consumption and regulating the manufacturing of cannabis, admitting the use of methadone and heroin for medical purposes.