Overcoming the 'Stockholm Syndrome', pt. 2 - Oh My Ghodse!

Here at HR2, we are still sifting through the various speeches and statements from the World Forum Against Drugs, held in Stockholm earlier this month. Today we came across the speech of Hamid Ghodse, President of the International Narcotics Control Board (INCB).

After passing a copy of the speech around the office, we decided we just couldn't let Professor Ghodse's comments stand without some serious fact checking.

His speech begins with the rather grand statement that:

'Throughout its forty years of existence, the International Narcotics Control Board has valued and benefited from the knowledge and actions of NGOs and other members of civil society in addressing the drug problem.'

Well, this would be great if it were true! In fact, INCB is notorious in the NGO-world for being completely closed to the participation of civil society. As stated last year by Professor Ghodse's predecessor, former INCB President Philip Emafo, the INCB's mandate is only to 'discuss with governments', and its mandate is 'not with civil society'. INCB's history of secrecy and unwillingness to engage with civil society is well documented is our report, 'Unique in International Relations?' as well as in the excellent report 'Closed to Reason: The International Narcotics Control Board and HIV/AIDS' by the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network and the Open Society Institute.

We hope Professor Ghodse's comments reflect a commitment that the INCB under his Presidency will welcome civil society participation, in the way so many other similar UN bodies do. We will wait and see.

Professor Ghodse then goes on to question 'harm reduction' (the quotation marks around the term are his).

'It is regrettable that, in some places today, injection rooms appear to be playing a similar role to that played by opium dens nearly a century ago. At best, injection rooms undermine the spirit of the Conventions which seek to limit the use of drugs to medical and scientific purposes. At worst, under the banner of “harm reduction”, they serve to normalise illicit drug use, which is both unhealthy and harmful, and violate the international drug control treaties.'

This statement raised more than one eyebrow around this office! With good reason....

In 2002, the INCB itself commissioned a study from the Legal Affairs Section of the UN Drug Control Program (UNDCP) entitled 'Flexibility of Treaty Provisions as regards Harm Reduction Approaches'. The UNDCP's own legal experts concluded that substitution treatment, needle exchange programmes and yes even safe injecting rooms do not breach the international drug control treaties.

Whatever Ghodse is basing his comments on, it clearly isn't the legal opinion of UNDCP's own legal division. How can harm reduction 'undermine the spirit of the [Drug] Conventions' when such programmes are consistent with - and not in violation of - the treaties? Seems a bit of a stretch, but we're sure it went down a treat with the harm reduction opponents behind the WFAD conference.

And while we're on the topic of the INCB and harm reduction, earlier this year the UN Office on Drugs and Crime in partnership with INCB produced a report entitled 'Reducing the adverse health and social consequences of drug abuse: A comprehensive approach'. This report explicitly supports harm reduction interventions such as needle exchange and substitution treatment. To quote from the Preface of the report:

'“Harm reduction” is often made an unnecessarily controversial issue as if there was a contradiction between prevention and treatment on one hand and reducing the adverse health and social consequences of drug use on the other. This is a false dichotomy. They are complementary.'

Apparently the notion that harm reduction is complementary to treatment and prevention has yet to trickle up to the INCB President's office. Interestingly enough, Ghodse is appointed to the INCB by the World Health Organization. As WHO explicitly supports harm reduction, one is left to wonder how and why their own appointee appears not to support WHO policy?

While Ghodse questions the validity of harm reduction, his speech lauds drug prevention programmes. However, he notes that 'prevention cannot be expected to be 100 per cent successful'.

While we certainly have no problem with drug prevention initiatives - so long as they are factual, non-sensational, non-stigmatising and properly evaluated as to their effectiveness - we have to wonder why it acceptable that prevention programmes are not expected to be 100% effective, when harm reduction programmes are criticised by the WFAD crowd when they aren't 100% effective? But as should be evident from above, internal consistency in not necessarily a strong suit of Professor Ghodse's speech.

Finally, Ghodse makes a number of statements on human rights. We certainly welcome his recognition of the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and his statement that 'we should be mindful of the importance of protecting human rights which are universal, indivisible and unalienable.' However, he then goes on to make up his own interpretation of international human rights law, talking about a right to 'be free from drug addiction'. As explored in our previous blog post on the WFAD conference, there is no such right under international human rights law (although this fact does not stop many anti-drug groups from trying to make one up).

Hope you enjoyed part 2 of our reports from WFAD. Stay tuned for the next installment coming soon......

Overcoming the 'Stockholm Syndrome': Five questions for the World Forum Against Drugs

There was a big party in Stockholm last week to which neither we, nor many of our friends, were invited. It was titled the World Forum Against Drugs (WFAD). Actually we’re not surprised we weren’t invited, as it was mostly only those soldiers marching in lock step with the ‘war on drugs’ who were included in the conference programme.

In essence, WFAD was the zero-tolerance crowd's response to the Beyond 2008 NGO Forum on Drugs, which took place in Vienna in July. That meeting agreed a significant Declaration and Recommendations from civil society to the Commission on Narcotic Drugs. As the drug warriors were unable to get their way in Vienna, they instead decided to organise their own party. The big ‘achievement’ of this event was the production of the Declaration of the World Forum Against Drugs, signed on September 10th by 11 organisations (Yes that's them in the photo, with Calvina Fay of the Drug Free America Foundation front and centre). Given that the WFAD conference says it hosted over 600 participants from 82 countries, 11 signatories is a pretty unimpressive number. By way of comparison, the Declaration of the Beyond 2008 NGO Forum was agreed by consensus by the 300 delegates in attendance.

Before IHRA feel we can consider adding our name to this new Declaration, there are a few questions we need WFAD to clarify for us (Sorry for the delay in making our decision, but as we weren’t invited to the Stockholm shindig we didn’t have a chance to ask them earlier).

So here we go.

1. Why does the WFAD Declaration misrepresent the broad international support for Harm Reduction?

The preamble of the WFAD Declaration states that 'some organizations and local governments actively advocate...and promote policies such as “harm reduction”'.

Wow, from this description one would think harm reduction is an approach limited only to the lunatic fringes of some out of touch local governments. In fact, at least 82 countries and territories worldwide support harm reduction in official policy. Harm reduction is the official policy of UNAIDS, UNICEF, WHO and the European Union. Even WFAD’s beloved UNODC and INCB support harm reduction now. All of this is detailed in our report, Global State of Harm Reduction 2008.

Come to think of it, the Declaration that came out of the Beyond 2008 NGO Forum in Vienna earlier this year (a meeting in which many of the signatories to the WFAD Declaration participated) supported harm reduction.

2. Why does the Declaration misrepresent the content of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child?

The WFAD Declaration in Art 1 states that it supports the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, and suggests that the Convention supports WFAD's opposition to harm reduction. This is simply untrue. In fact, the Convention guarantees the right to access to information (Art 13) and the right to health (Art 24), which according to UN experts includes harm reduction as a means of preventing epidemic diseases.

The WFAD Declaration then misquotes Art 33 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, suggesting it ‘stipulates…that children have the right to be protected from drug abuse.’ In reality, Art 33 states that governments ‘shall take all appropriate measures, including legislative, administrative, social and educational measures, to protect children from the illicit use of narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances’. This is really quite different than what WFAD claims. For example, the use of methadone and buprenorphine to treat opioid dependence is not an ‘illicit use’, so is outside of the remit of Art 33. Harm reduction as a part of a rights based approach to HIV prevention is supported by UNICEF (They support IHRA's conference in fact). Harm reduction is even supported by Save the Children Sweden (who supported WFAD!)

The WFAD Declaration is also against decriminalisation of drug users, even though the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child has consistently stated when discussing Art 33 that young people who use drugs should not be treated as criminals. UNICEF has also said (in their implementation handbook for the Convention) that placing harsh sentences on children who use drugs is a deeply ineffective form of protection.

The WFAD Declaration is also explicitly in favour of random school drug testing. Hard to reconcile that position with its supposed concern for the rights of children and young people. Indeed, the Convention on the Rights of the Child states that the child has the right to privacy (Art 16) and freedom from self incrimination and due process of law (Art 40).

And as an aside, given that so many of the speakers at the WFAD conference and signatories to its Declaration were from the USA (one of only two countries in the world that has not ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child), we wonder if we can count on our US colleagues attending WFAD to lobby the US government to support the treaty!!

3. Can you explain the reference to ‘drug abuse’ as ‘slavery’ in Art 2 of the Declaration?

The WFAD Declaration states that 'Drug dependence is a modern form of slavery'.

The legal definition of slavery under international law is contained in Art 1 of the 1927 Slavery Convention. It says that:

(1) Slavery is the status or condition of a person over whom any or all of the powers attaching to the right of ownership are exercised.

(2) The slave trade includes all acts involved in the capture, acquisition or disposal of a person with intent to reduce him to slavery; all acts involved in the acquisition of a slave with a view to selling or exchanging him; all acts of disposal by sale or exchange of a slave acquired with a view to being sold or exchanged, and, in general, every act of trade or transport in slaves.

We're sure that equating drugs with 'slavery' is probably an effective bit of hyperbole to whip up the zero-tolerance crowd. Indeed, Robert DuPont of the US employed this nonsensical analogy to great effect in his keynote address at the conference. We particularly love the bit where he says that 'Harm Reduction policies accept and even extend chemical slavery'. (We really don't make this stuff up. It's on page 9.)

But honestly, it really is pretty hard to see how drug use fits into the definition of slavery. Sure, drug dependency can potentially be deleterious to a person's health and well-being (of course not all persons who use drugs are dependent upon them, but that's another matter). Still it is not clear to us how a person's choice to use drugs leads to slavery. Can a person enslave themselves? Can they volunteer to be a slave? If drug dependency is a 'modern form of slavery', are ‘recovered addicts’ the modern equivalent of run-away slaves?

And as an aside, given the huge over incarceration of African-Americans in the US as a result of the 'war on drugs', isn't this analogy just a little insensitive?

Of course there are indeed modern forms of slavery occurring in the world today. In case the WFAD folks - or anyone else - is interested in working to end real forms of contemporary slavery, here is a good background document produced by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.

4. Can you please point to the international treaty that states that ‘All people have the right to…have a life free of drug abuse.’?

As is perhaps evident from our previous questions, the drug warriors have a habit of playing fast and loose with the facts of international law. This is another example found in Art 2 of the WFAD Declaration. The ‘right to a drug free world’ or a ‘right to be drug free’ is one that is often claimed by the zero-tolerance, anti-harm reduction crowd to support their cause. The problem is that there ain’t one!

Whether WFAD likes it or not, you can’t just make up international law. International law is created by international treaties agreed between states. And there is no human rights treaty that enshrines a right to be drug free or to a drug free world.

While it is perhaps unfair to expect WFAD to be knowledgeable on international law, lots of the rest of us are. HR2, for one, is a programme that works specifically in international human rights law. So if WFAD can point out some human rights treaty that we have missed, perhaps they would be so kind as to do so. (And please don't cite Art 33 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. It doesn't say this, and we'd be happy to explain why if the actual wording of the provision itself isn't clear enough.)

5. How do you reconcile the Declaration’s opposition to harm reduction with Art 5, which ‘urge[s] all people to work with their governments to strengthen, support, and encourage…the Office of Drugs and Crime, the International Narcotics Control Board…[and] the World Health Organization’. All of these bodies support harm reduction!

This question is self explanatory….

Anyway, these are the first five questions we have, and we have only gone through 5 of the 24 articles in the WFAD Declaration.

Needless to say, watch this space for more....

Commentaries to the all the UN Drug Conventions now available online

IHRA recently received digital copies of the Official Commentaries on the 1961, 1971 and 1988 UN Drug Conventions, as well as the Commentary to the 1972 Protocol amending the 1961 Convention, from the Legal and Treaty Affairs team at UNODC.

These four volumes, each several hundred pages in length, are the official (although non-binding) explanatory notes from the UN to member states on how to interpret each of the articles in the Conventions. In essence, the Commentaries put ‘meat on the bone’ in providing detailed guidance to states on what the drug conventions mean, don’t mean and how they are to be interpreted and implemented.

Unfortunately the pdf files for these important and hard to find documents are massive (some as much as 50mb each), and the HR2 team has been struggling to find a way to make them available online.

As an interim solution we have stored them on an online document storage website.

The 1971, 1972 and 1988 Commentaries are available in English, Spanish and French at www.dropboks.com.

The 1988 Commentary is also available in Chinese, Arabic and Russian.

Simply go to www.dropboks.com and enter the email address damon.barrett(at)ihra.net and the password commentaries.

Bear in mind, however, that they are extremely large in some cases and may take some time to download!

Unfortunately the Commentary to the 1961 Convention is too large even to go onto this website! However, it has been online (English only) for many years at DrugText.

We are currently working out a permanent, faster and more simple solution which will include the English, French and Spanish versions of the 1961 Commentary.

Unfortunately we have been unable to find information on the elusive '1977 UN narcotics convention' that will apparently 'guide' the work of the World Forum Against Drugs in September in Sweden. To our knowledge, there is no such 1977 UN drug convention. But then again, a lack of evidence has never influenced the zero-tolerance crowd before!!! UPDATE: The World Forum Against Drugs has now amended their website. Nice to know somebody reads our blog.

CND day 2 - IHRA statement on human rights and harm reduction during plenary debate on demand reduction

This afternoon, during the second day of the 51st session of the Commission on Narcotic Drugs, IHRA's Senior Policy Advisor, Rick Lines (at bottom left of the photo-click on image to get full size) addressed delegates during a plenary debate on demand reduction.

A copy of IHRA's statement is below.

"Each December, the UN General Assembly adopts a resolution entitled 'International cooperation against the world drug problem'. This resolution states that drug control activities must be 'carried out in full conformity with the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations and…with full respect for…all human rights and fundamental freedoms'.

This resolution of the UN’s highest policy-setting body directs CND to prioritise human rights. Yet to date, mention of human rights has been almost completely absent from CND’s work. In effect, CND has failed in its obligation to take direction from the General Assembly.

This year agencies across the UN system celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. And in this year we see hope for change.

We welcome Mr. Costa’s comments yesterday on the need to promote human rights in drug control activities, including the need to end the death penalty for drug offences. We welcome the statement in INCB’s most recent Annual Report that 'Due respect for universal human rights…is important' and that 'Non-respect…can undermine the conventions.'

Such words are important. But words are not enough. True leadership comes only when words are turned into action. We need action from CND to ensure that international human rights law is placed at the heart of its work.

What does human rights leadership from CND mean?

Human rights leadership means taking action to promote the right to health. For example, last year the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Health affirmed that the provision of harm reduction programmes is a necessary part of State obligations to fulfill the right to health. In this context, human rights leadership means that CND must robustly and unambiguously support harm reduction measures such as syringe exchange, opioid substitution treatment and safe injecting rooms, among other interventions. It also means ensuring that drug treatment programmes are voluntary and not coercive. It means that statements from drug control bodies like INCB are based on evidence and human rights obligations, and that affirmative action is taken to correct misinformation.

Leadership also means taking action to prevent human rights abuses in the name of drug control before they occur, and speaking out when there is legitimate fear of imminent human rights violations.

For example, in recent weeks, there have been indications from the Royal Thai government that it plans to resume its 'war on drugs'. It is important that UN agencies and Member States seek clarification of the government’s intentions in this regard. However, recent public comments by a government Minister have raised fears among many that the State intends to relaunch the campaign of extrajudicial killings seen in 2003, in which over 2,800 people were killed. This campaign was criticised by the UN Human Rights Committee, among other human rights monitors. Leadership on human rights means that CND and Member States must speak out clearly against abusive 'drug-control' policies wherever they occur.

Leadership on human rights means ensuring that UN-sponsored drug control activities have the promotion of human rights as key performance indicator, one fully integrated into programme planning and evaluation. We enjoin CND to ensure that UN drug control agencies undertake human rights impact assessments of all activities prior to their approval and implementation, as well as during and after the approved activities have begun. Only through such a process of assessment and monitoring can we be certain that UN-sponsored drug enforcement programmes do not result in human rights violations, and that they effectively promote the respect and fulfillment of human rights and the rule of law that is central to the UN’s mission.

Finally, leadership on human rights means using the democratic majority voting mechanism provided for CND under ECOSOC in cases where consensus is not possible on human rights issues, and ending the current status quo where a small handful of Member States are allowed to block human rights language in CND resolutions. This status quo undermines the promotion and protection human rights, a mission fundamental to the object and purpose of the UN. When consensus is not achievable, CND Members must vote and let the world see which States are willing to stand up to support human rights, and which are not.

In this 60th anniversary year of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, we can no longer allow the 'spirit of Vienna' to undermine the spirit of the Declaration."

Thanks to Steve Rolles at Transform Drug Policy Foundation for the photo.

CND day 1 - War on Drugs does not Justify Rights Violations: New Report Examines Widespread Abuses Due to Drug Control Policies

(Vienna, March 10, 2008) – The United Nations must stop the ongoing subversion of human rights in the name of drug control, the International Harm Reduction Association, Human Rights Watch, the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network and the Beckley Foundation Drug Policy Programme said in a joint report released today as the UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND) convenes for its annual meeting to debate global drug policy. The report, Recalibrating the Regime: The Need for a Human Rights-Based Approach to International Drug Policy examines the tensions between the international drug control system and UN human rights standards, highlighting the multiple ways in which the enforcement of drug control prohibition – the dominant approach of the UN system – has led to widespread and serious human rights violations. Yet, despite numerous instances of human rights abuses perpetrated in the name of drug control, there has been little engagement with this issue by bodies such as the International Narcotics Control Board (INCB) and CND or by the human rights treaty bodies.

The report will be presented during a panel discussion on the worldwide human rights impact of the war on drugs from 1h30 – 15h00 at the Vienna International Centre, 7th floor, Conference Room 2. Speakers will address key issues covered in the report, including the use of the death penalty for drug offenses, barriers to HIV prevention and treatment, and repressive and abusive law enforcement measures.

“The UN General Assembly has stated repeatedly in resolutions that drug control must be carried out in full conformity with, and full respect for, all human rights and fundamental freedoms,” said Mike Trace of the Beckley Foundation, which commissioned the report. “Delegations to this week’s meeting must ensure that their obligations under international human rights law underpin all CND deliberations and actions.”

“Despite the primacy of human rights obligations under the UN Charter, the approach of the UN system and the wider international community to addressing the tensions between drug control and human rights remains ambiguous,” said Richard Elliott of the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network. “This is inexcusable in the face of the egregious human rights abuses perpetrated in the course of enforcing drug prohibition, which in turn damages global efforts to prevent and treat HIV.”

The groups expressed particular concern at the recent public comments by the government of Thailand that it intends to resume former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra’s notorious “war on drugs,” which in 2003 resulted in some 2,800 extra-judicial killings.

“As the UNODC has acknowledged, there are proven methods to address drug use while protecting human rights. Murder is not one of them,” said Rebecca Schleifer, advocate with the HIV/AIDS and Human Rights Program at Human Rights Watch. “As a member of the CND, Thailand must be held to account for its actions on drugs, and pressure brought by the international community to ensure that human rights violations are not repeated.”

“Last week, INCB President Philip Emafo stated in the board’s 2008 annual report that ‘To do nothing [about drugs] is not an option’,” said Rick Lines of the International Harm Reduction Association. “We are here today to state clearly that doing nothing about the human rights abuses perpetrated in the name of the drug war is also not an option. In this, the 60th anniversary year of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, CND member states and indeed the entire UN family must speak out clearly that human rights must not be sacrificed on the altar of drug control.”

HIV? Human Rights Abuses?...The INCB Has More Pressing Concerns

Today, Hamid Ghodse and Philip Emafo of the International Narcotics Control Board launched a media offensive in the UK as part of the release of INCB’s 2007 Annual Report. Appearing on Channel 4 News, Channel 5 News, the BBC website and the front page of this morning’s London Metro, both Board members raised their concerns as UN drug control 'experts' on what they see as an issue of key importance.

Here is a hint:

It is not ensuring access to harm reduction services to prevent HIV and hepatitis C transmission through injecting drug use and to ensure the right to health of all people who use drugs.

It is not ensuring access, for everyone in need, to opiates for pain relief, including those with terminal diseases.

It is not raising their concerns about a possible reinstatement of the ‘war on drugs’ in Thailand which, in 2003, claimed the lives of over 2,500 people through extrajudicial killings.

No, the United Nations body responsible for overseeing the international drug control conventions is worried about celebrities using drugs, claiming that dealing with famous people in a lenient manner encourages a permissive attitude to drugs among young people.

There are a number of extremely troubling aspects to the Board’s position in this regard.

Firstly, an international body geared towards monitoring the three UN drug control conventions has far more pressing concerns than what Kate Moss is snorting or Amy Winehouse is smoking. Thirty percent of all HIV infections, excluding Sub-Saharan Africa, are through unsafe injecting drug use, an issue that is all but ignored in the report apart from some mentions of harm reduction without positive commentary. The Board visited Brazil in 2007 and the country features in this year’s report. Yet there is no mention of the hundreds of deaths in the favelas through indiscriminate police violence. The INCB also visited Viet Nam in 2007, but has not mentioned the all too common application of the death penalty for drug offences in violation of international human rights law.

Secondly, the Board has created a new category of offender, the ‘celebrity user’, one to be made an example of for the benefit of the greater good, something that is completely outside its mandate under the conventions. Indeed the INCB presents no evidence that celebrities are treated more leniently in the first place. This also runs contrary to the ostensible commitment to ‘equality before the law’ focused on in this year’s annual report.

Thirdly, what Ghodse and Emafo are saying, in effect, is that we should criminalise drug users, a position entirely contradictory to the first chapter of the INCB Annual Report, which calls for a focus on traffickers and not individual users.

This aspect of the Annual Report has been, until now, all but overlooked, with organisations such as TNI and IDPC rightly focusing on the more pressing issues of human rights and harm reduction.

Today’s publicity, however, cannot be ignored. The International Narcotics Control Board should be worried less about soundbites and more about the real issues and the lives of millions affected by their work.

IHRA criticises INCB working practices in a new report

The International Narcotics Control Board (INCB or the Board) plays an important role in the international drug control system, serving as an independent body monitoring states’ implementation of their obligations under the international drug conventions. It has, however, been criticised for being one of the most secretive bodies in the UN system. It holds its meetings behind closed doors. No minutes are published. There is no opportunity for non-governmental organisations (NGOs) or civil society organisations to observe or make submissions.

The INCB has claimed that it is ‘unique in international relations’, and has used this allegedly unique status to justify its exclusion of civil society from its deliberations and its closed meetings. However, far from being unique, the INCB is instead an early example of the ‘independent committee of experts’ model that has been adopted and developed within the UN human rights system, and regional human rights systems, over the past four decades. It is a common model that continues to be used today. Yet in contrast to these similar bodies, the INCB has failed to modernise its processes, and retains working practices inherited from defunct monitoring bodies.

This report analyses the structure, legal status, mandate and activities of the INCB and compares them to the UN Human Rights Treaty Bodies. It questions the Board’s claim that its must by mandate operate in secret and to the exclusion of civil society and it concludes that the Board is not bound by law or mandate by the working methods it has chosen and that it can look to other similarly constituted bodies in the UN system for guidance on civil society engagement and transparency.