"Linka 158" (*), Prague, 5 October 1990

Q: Mr. Pietrosanti, what do you antiprohibitionists want?

A: Let's start by saying that the situation in Prague or Bratislava or Brno is certainly better than the one in Berlin or New York, however I think no one should delude oneself: drugs are coming here too, and plentiful.

The real tragedy of drugs is that they are left in the hands of the criminal power. We antiprohibitionists do not want to liberalize anything: we propose the legalization of drugs, we want them to be under the control of the state institutions. All drugs. Let us look at the current situation: it is in this precise moment that drugs are free, completely free; they can be purchased at any street corner of New York, Rome, London or Paris; soon they will be freely available in Prague as well, if we do not move in time. We simply, sensibly, want these substances to no longer be free, but want the use of drugs to be regulated, controlled, taxed and discouraged.

Q: Could you explain this better? What the change consist of?

A: A dose of heroin - if it were not prohibited - would cost a few Crowns; instead it costs several thousands. It is this, it is prohibition that produces huge profits for the mafia, the drug-traffickers, who have all the interest in perpetuating a situation that brings so much money into their pockets - which also means a huge amount of power. By legalizing drugs, by subtracting them from the hands of mafia, we would inflict a tremendous blow to it; and the drug addicts would be out of the criminal circuit, which represents, for the vast majority of them, the only possibility of getting the money necessary to buy their dose. Some important experiences - those of Amsterdam and Liverpool, among others - proved that the controlled distribution of narcotics blocks and in the long run reduces the number of drug addicts, whilst the rate of AIDS infections (because they are no longer forced to share needles) and the number of deaths due to overdose drop drastically.

Q: But the mafia would turn to other activities, and we would have to start all over again...

A: It has been estimated that one dollar invested in the sector of drugs yields 700 dollars: in the history of humanity there has never before been such a profitable activity. Think of what the mafia would be without without these incredibly high profits. Instead of enforcing measures to destroy these profits, the legislators toughen the penalties for the traffickers and go so far as to punish the drug addicts. This is not only ineffective, but favours the great profits that are the cause of everything. Think: to take a small plane loaded with cocaine clandestinely from Mexico to the U.S. territory, a pilot earns 100,000 $. He risks being captured or even shot down, but for every 10 planes shot down or caught there are 1,000 ready to replace them. And also: in spite of the fact that these last 8-9 years have witnessed the greatest and most aggressive anti-drug campaign of history, the quantity of cocaine imported and put on the U.S. market has been so immense that the prices are now much lower than before:

therefore, what is the purpose of prohibiting and repressing? Prohibition has failed, because until the mechanism of profits is not attacked, nothing will change, and the problem will only become worse.

Q: Don't you believe that the number of drug addicts would increase? If taking drugs means risking a sanction, many will avoid doing it.

A: American prohibition in the twenties proves the contrary. Do you know how the the person who sells drugs in the street is called? A "pusher", that is, a person who "pushes". And it is quite obvious: it is precisely prohibition which, by making drugs the most profitable business of history, causes each new drug addict to become a treasure. It is in the mafia's interest to make the number of drug addicts increase. If drugs were legalized, none of all this would occur: no one would push people to take drugs.

Q: Don't you think this is too easy to be true?

A: Of course, it is not easy at all; but it is the only solution. On the other hand, the problem is extremely complex, and cannot be fully explained in an interview.

Imagine that drugs were distributed by the State to all who want them, or at least all those who need them. The incredible profits made by the mafia would cease abruptly, just as the thefts and the robberies made to get the money necessary for the daily dose would. Drug addicts would get out of the criminal milieu and would no longer die in the streets, poisoned by drugs, with a needle stuck in their arm. Because, you see, people die with drugs diluted with strychnine, or even worse with chalk and lime (the mafia makes more money); and not so much of drugs themselves. Moreover, thousands and thousands of police agents and magistrates would no longer be forced to deal with the crimes committed by the drug addicts, and immense economic resources would be freed, to be used for programmes for the assistance and detoxication of the drug addicts, and to discourage the use the use of narcotic substances: the U.S. campaign on tobacco, for example, has given excellent results. I said "information", and I would like t

o underline this. Information is scarce. You see, the antiprohibitionist position gathers people of different, at times even extremely different positions, brought together by a common intelligence as regards this subject: think of Nobel Prize Milton Friedman, former U.S. Secretary of State George Schultz, the Economist, possibly the most authoritative economic magazine of the world, or of the stance recently taken by the London Times, and many others...I am certain that the government, the Parliament, the police forces of this country, are not lacking and will not lack this intelligence.

(*) Fortnightly magazine published by the Czechoslovakian police.