Reuters Sep 26, 2012
By Brian Winter
UNITED NATIONS, Sept 26 (Reuters) - The United Nations should lead a global debate over a less "prohibitionist" approach to drug policy, Mexican President Felipe Calderon said on Wednesday in the latest attempt by a Latin American leader to float possible changes to international narcotics laws.
Calderon, who leaves office on Dec. 1 after spending much of his presidency locked in a bloody battle with drug-smuggling gangs, told the U.N. General Assembly that organized crime was "one of the most serious threats of our time."
"Today, I am proposing formally that (the United Nations) ... carry out a far-reaching assessment of the progress and the limits of the current prohibitionist approach to drugs," Calderon said.
Calderon did not specifically say what an alternative approach to drug policy might look like. However, he and some other Latin American leaders including Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos have suggested they might be open to legalization of some narcotics if that helped reduce violence. Read more.
The MexicoBlog of the Americas Program, a fiscally sponsored program of the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR), is written by Laura Carlsen. I monitor and analyze international press on Mexico, with a focus on security, immigration, human rights and social movements for peace and justice, from a feminist perspective. And sometimes I simply muse.
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