"Golos Ukrayiny" newspaper, May 31, 1995

Demonstrations in front of Netherlands embassies in Kiev and in more than 100 cities of the world were held on May 19 for support of Dutch policy concerning drugs.

That policy attracts a special attention of world community since the middle of last year. This summer the parliament of Netherlands will examine a file of documents and proposals of Ministries for justice and for health protection in connection with elaboration of concrete policy of Netherlands concerning drugs.

The government and the parliament of Netherlands bear a great influence of UN and European Union. The goal of pressures is to make Netherlands join the policy of prohibition.

The essential of prohibitionist policy is prohibition of distribution and storage of drug and psychotropic substances. The prohibition is corroborated by appropriate articles of criminal codes, by police activities, etc. As a result of such policy, according to Mr. Olivier Dupuis from International Anti-Prohibitionist League, we have several negative social phenomena, such as: spread of AIDS, uncontrolled use of substitute drugs of bad quality, increase of use of "heavy" drugs that quickly destroy physical and psychical health of a user... But the greatest evil is that the prohibitionist policy of European governments stimulates underground drug business -- the most influential, branched, rich and terrible one of all. Ukraine, according to experts of National Central bureau of Interpolo, is steadily integrating into international drug trade: more drug addicts in Ukraine, more work for police, and more dollars in foreign banks for drug businessmen...

It is hard to foresee what will the result of debates in Netherlands parliament be. The more hard is to tell what a lesson may Ukraine learn of that, because the poppy in Ukraine is sowed in more that a million of farms, the hemp (lat. cannabis) in the South is not worse than one from India, and the legitimate drug -- raw vodka -- is used by nearly every third man till he goes unconscious.

One thing we can say definitely: the stronger is prohibition, the stronger is struggle and temptation: every third Ukrainian schoolboy has at least "tried" some drug, and he did it just to know what "the forbidden fruit" is. Moreover, the drug mafia, being concerned about its profits, will try to enlarge the market of sale, so we'll have more and more "druggies" expelled from active social life...

written by Maxim But