Politics Outside US

Britishers researchers are calling on the government to roll out heroin maintenance programs for chronic addicts who don't respond to other treatments. They've just released a new clinical study that makes their case.

This week's outbreak of violence between supporters of a drug gang leader and Jamaican police and soldiers in the Kingston slum neighborhood of Tivoli Gardens reveals not only the weakness of the Jamaican state, but also some usually obscure links between politicians and the underworld.

At least 32 countries have laws on the books allowing for the death penalty for some drug offenses. The United States is one of them. And as many as a thousand people a year face execution for drug offenses, according to a new report.

You can already legally possess up to 10 grams of pot in Berlin, but the city-state's health administrator thinks that isn't enough. She says, "I'll see your 10 and raise you 5."

Can the Dutch ban foreigners from going to their famous cannabis cafes? The city of Maastricht tried it, and now the European Court of Justice will decide whether the move conflicts with the European Union's laws regarding free trade.

The leader of Britain's largest nurses' union has called for prescribing heroin to addicts through the National Health Service. His union debated the issue this week, but made no decision.

Bermuda has long taken a hard-line on marijuana possession, but now members of the ruling party are suggesting it's time for a change.

In the violent and volatile world of Mexican drug cartels, no alliance is forever. Now, the Zetas have grown too threatening, and the other cartels are joining forces against them. Meanwhile, Chapo Guzman and his Sinaloa cartel have taken Ciudad Juarez.

It's science vs. politics in British drug policy, and the scientists are growing tired of having evidence-based policies trumped by political considerations. Two more members of the government's Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs have resigned in recent days over the spat.

The body count in Mexico's prohibition related violence this week topped 19,000, as President Felipe Calderon's war on the so-called cartels continues to reap high levels of bloodshed.