(First preliminary English edition - April 1989 - 76 pages - Special number of the EMNDP-Newsletter, ISSN 1011-1336

(This document is subdivided in 10 texts within Agora'. To retreive the texts please digit the key-word "drug policy").

"Cigarettes are as addictive as heroin or cocaine" (Chick Koop, Surgeon General of USA; april 1988 (U.S.News World Report, May 30, 1988, p. 62).

Secretary A.Bahi van INCB (in: South, august'88 p. 12): The solution lies in solving the problems which have caused people to take drugs; to tackle the problems of society itself.

Ch. Schuster (director NIDA) July 1988. On the Dutch television programme "Brandpunt" (a newsreel programme): drugs are primarily a public health problem and not primarily a police or judicial problem.

prof.Stephan Quensel (introduction of a political initiative in Bremen, May 1987): The potential risks of illegal drugs are less than those of legal drugs.

Karst Bestemann (execitive director of the Alcohol and Drug Problems Association of North America) on the International Conference on Drug Policy Reform (Drug Policy Foundation, Washington, September 1988) expressed his belief that the "war on drugs" is actually a "war on people".

Drugs are illicit because they are dangerous. In fact they are dangerous because they are illicit (Georges Apap, Procureur de la République in Valence, France).

In the August 1988 edition of the London monthly "South" an article summarizing the findings of 7 journalists from all parts of the world was published. In the article a connection was made between the narcotics trade, national debt, poverty and foreign policy. The estimated worldwide trade in narcotics averages U.S $ 600 billion per year. More and more third world countries are becoming dependent on drugs as an export commodity.

In Bolivia (population 7 million) 1/2 million people are dependent on the drugs trade for their income. The trade in cocaine accounts for twice the earnings made in legal exports (1987). Corruption of governmental authorities (incl. the judiciary) is common.

Earnings from the trade in cocaine in prosperous Columbia, forms a quarter of that made through legal exports. More and more farmers in South America are planting the cocaplant, such as in Peru. Venezuela and Mexico are compensating their falling oil revenues with the earning made by trading drugs.

In Libanon there is a lot of money to be made in the hashish trade, even though compared to Europe hashish, it is very cheap there.

In Karachi 1 in 9 young people are addicted to heroin. In Malaisia 1% of the population are registered as drug addicts, despite the fact that, just as in Thailand, the death penalty threatens those who trade in drugs (and this need not be for the trading of large quantities of illicit drugs). Since 1975 62 people have been executed for this offence in Thailand. Both countries are strongly directed toward the U.S.A. and are being financially supported by UNFDAC in the destruction of papaver plantations and the establishment of therapeutic facilities (always drugfree) modelled on those in the west.

In Iran more then 600 people have been executed for 'drugtrade'in 1989 no answer about any of my questions about these executions was

given to me by the Ambassy of Iran in The Netherlands.

The illegal drug market is big business. In the U.S.A. alone, there are 56 million regular users of cocaine; 1/2 million heroin users and at least 18 million marijuana users.

According to "South", the fight against drugs is a war without strategy. Only large scale writingoff of third world debts, combined with economic help would reduce the dependence on the production and trading of drugs.