Current status of the draft law
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Federal Law "On narcotic substances and psychotropics" has been tabled by the following members of the State Duma: V. A. Vorogushin (Communist Party of Russian Federation - CPRF), N. F. Gerasimenko (Russian Regions), V. I. Davidenko (Liberal Democratic Party of Russia - LDPR), V. I. Iljukhin (CPRF), V. A. Kazakovcev (CPRF), N. V. Kriveljskaja (LDPR), L. V. Pobedinskaja.
The responsible committees: Health Care Committee; Security Committee. The responsible committee in Council of Federation: Committee on Science, Culture, Education, Health Care and Environment; Committee on Security and Defense.
Adopted by the State Duma in the first reading on April 25, 1996. Adopted by the State Duma in the second reading on December 20, 1996 (Resolution No. 951-II GD). Adopted by the State Duma in the third reading on February 12, 1997 (Resolution No. 1076-II GD).
Rejected by the Council of Federation on April 16, 1997 (Resolution No. 104-SF).
The Agreement Commission has been created (Resolutions No. 104-SF and 1395-II GD): April 16, 1997 and May 14, 1997.
Adopted by the State Duma in the third reading in the edition of the Agreement Commission on June 23, 1997.
Adopted by the Council of Federation on July 4, 1997 (Resolution No. 273-SF).
Vetoed by the President of Russian Federation on July 23, 1997. President's motivation: Adoption of this law provides in particular creation of new inter-ministry bodies, however the changing by a federal law of the structure of federal bodies of executive authority and determining of their competence contradicts to the principle of dividing between authorities fixed in the Constitution. It represents invasion into the constitutional competence of the President and Government.
Details of the draft law
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The draft law is a good example of an extremist prohibitionism. Its adoption would mean not only a serious regress on the battle field against drug addiction and drug policy. This draft law represents very serious danger for civil rights and democracy in Russia. I will point out here only that positions in the law which would change the existing order and would really deteriorate existing situation.
1. Draft law establishes that use of drugs and psychotropics belonging to the Lists II and III is allowed only in medical purposes, and substances from the List I are not allowed to be used in any case (Articles 1 and 2).
2. Draft law establishes that "illegal" (in sense of the 1st paragraph) use of drugs and psychotropics is prohibited, and drug users fall under legal responsibility (Article 40). According the estimations of Mr. Gerasimenko, chairman of the Health Care Committee of the State Duma and author of this draft law, about 10% of population in Russian Federation are using drugs. According to some other estimations, there are about 20% of such people among youth. Therefore, authors of the draft law propose to consider a criminal every fifth youth Russian.
3. Draft law in Article 44 allows the forced medical examination of a person, supposed to be a drug addict, or that he/she has illegally used a drug substance. It is enough the simple decision of an investigator or even a police officer to be dispatched for such an examination.
4. Draft law (Article 54) establishes that treatment of drug addicts is carried out with their agreement, but specifies just in the second line, that "drug addicts evading the treatment are subjected to the forced medical measures".
5. Draft law prohibits treatment of drug addiction by the substances from List II (Article 31). Actually, we are witnessing an attempt to ban harm reduction measures: to prohibit not only controlled distribution of heroin among drug addicts, but also methadone therapy.
6. Draft law establishes that treatment of drug addicts may be carried out only in state- or municipal-property health care institutions, discriminating private, public and church medical institutions (Article 55).
7. Draft law prohibits private physicians to use in their medical work medicines from the Lists II and III (Article 31).
8. Article 46 prohibits any distribution of any drug-related information ("about ways and methods of elaboration, production and use, as well as places of acquisition") - by any mean: books, publications in mass media, computer networks.
