Cocaine

A leading Scottish police chief says it is time to consider prescribing hard drugs to users in a bid to get a grip on acquisitive crime. Perhaps the Scottish new prime minister of Britain will lend an ear to the idea.

The US Supreme Court has agreed to hear the case of a Virginia man sentenced under the harsh federal crack cocaine laws. This is the third case having to do with federal sentencing the court has taken in recent months.

A new report from the UN drug office warns that Central America is being submerged in drugs and crime. It recommends heightening prohibitionist efforts.

Two years ago, drug czar John Walters trumpeted rising cocaine prices as evidence the drug war was working. But the overall trend is toward lower prices and higher purity, and Walters doesn't want to talk about that.

Tensions are rising in Peru's Upper Huallaga Valley coca fields, as government eradicators come under attack, growers go on strike, and the García government vows to take a hard line.

A Scottish Labor Party politician is taking his party to task for turning away from harm reduction policies in favor of a hard-line approach, and he says marijuana ought to be decriminalized, and maybe heroin and cocaine, too.

The "coca, si; cocaine, no" policy of Bolivian President Evo Morales has brought peace to a region long riven by conflict and repression. But while coca farmers need no longer worry about violent conflict with the state, they are still having a hard time making enough money to survive. Plans are underway to do something about that.

Just a little over a year into his term, Bolivian President Evo Morales is engineering a "coca, yes; cocaine, no" policy that is reducing tension there and leading to cooperative eradication efforts with farmers. Will the US government go along with it?

Vancouver Mayor Sam Sullivan wants to start a pilot stimulant maintenance program for up to 700 hard-core cocaine and meth users in the city's Downtown Eastside. Now he has released a poll showing strong support for the idea among Vancouver residents.

Vancouver Mayor Sam Sullivan has called for stimulant maintenance trials for more than 700 hard-core methamphetamine and cocaine users as part of a broad plan to improve the quality of life in the city before the 2010 Winter Olympics.