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Notes on Vienna 2009 by Prof. Robin Room
 
 

The two stars of the speaker's list were Queen Silvia and Evo Morales. Queen Silvia of Sweden was speaking on behalf of the Mentor Foundation and sort of for the NGOs, although at the very end Michel Perron of the Canadian CCSA got to speak for the Vienna NGO caucus. Evo Morales, president of Bolivia, was the highest-ranking politician to attend. He swept into the hall with a phalanx of plainclothes Bolivian security men to make the argument that coca-chewing was an acceptable cultural practice that should not be included on the Conventions. He emphasised his point by pulling out a coca leaf and chewing it in the course of his speech. The water of the meeting opened before him and closed after him without the slightest sign of any eddy or backflow.

The agreed-on "political declaration", which had to be adopted by consensus, had been hammered out over the previous 5 months. The chair obviously deemed it adopted without any formal procedure. Then the German delegate stood up on behalf of 25 nations (the list read out slowly) and introduced an "annex" which stated that those countries would read the phrase "related support measures" used in the document as including measures called "harm reduction measures" whenever it occurred, and asked that this statement be annexed to the report of the meeting. This minor rebellion seems to have been hatched in secret, to keep an element of surprise. An odd assortment of countries stood up to complain about the German statement afterward, claiming that no such thing was allowed - including Cuba, Colombia, the US, Sri Lanka, Japan, Russia. But there it was: the veil of consensus had been breached, however slightly.

A parallel workshop session was held each morning and afternoon of the two days, each on a topic which extended over at least three lines of text - everyone's favourites had obviously been squashed together. I heard very little of these sessions, although at the end of one Amanda and I were introduced to its chair, Eduardo Medina-Mora, the Mexican Attorney General (and Maria-Elena Medina-Mora's brother).

  At the very end of the plenary session, Costa, the director-general of the UNODC, gave a closing speech, sounding rather defensive. "The press have not been very kind to us", he said "I don't think it's right. It is more of a general impression - I met with the NGOs and observers - there was a feeling that not enough had been accomplished in the last 10 years. I believe this is also not right. Statistically speaking, in terms of the raw numbers, the drugs economy has stabilized since 2003. Those who do not like the Conventions can parade addicts that still exist. They hope they will be able to convince a larger share of the public and the press. In 2003 the stability started - is this a chronological coincidence?" [Presumably referring to the 5-year review sessions.]

"Processes do count", Costa added defensively, "countries have improved. There is a growing sense of shared responsibility - just a slogan 10 years ago, but nurtured in the last 10 years." He stressed the need for better data collection, emphasised new partnerships on treatment with WHO, "a big muscular organization within the UN system", and on development with the World Bank, "another noble institution". He mentioned the need of countries to "implement the firearm protocols, which have been an orphan" of the Convention against Crime, also managed by the UNODC. The protocols "are in force, but the major players are not there". And he paid some dues to "human rights issues", noting that UNODC had brought forward the issues of the "proportionality of punishment" and of extrajudicial killings". All in all, it struck me as a rather defensive performance from someone who knew he was on the wrong side of history. On the other hand, the idea that no agreement could be used on the use of the term "harm reduction" in the document is to me a sign of how stuck the system is.

Prof. Robin Room
Cannabis Commission
 

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