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• W2159780401 abstract "This editorial will contend that the execution of people convicted of drug trafficking and other drug-related offences is a penalty that should be abolished, as it is both ineffective as a policy measure and abhorrent in terms of human rights violation 1. That conclusion will be offered after due examination of contrary arguments, and with respectful acknowledgement of the fact that different cultures have different beliefs as to what constitutes justice. The editorial will go on to argue that the international addictions science community has a responsibility to support the abolitionist cause—silence cannot be an appropriate response in the face of such continued and irrational judicial killings. If the death penalty were to be struck out generally from every retentionist country's statute book, executions for drug offences would, in passing, of course be abolished. Since the end of the Second World War the strong trend in many parts of the world has been towards such general abolition. A recent report 2 suggests that as of 2007, a total of 135 nations have abolished this penalty by law or practice, with 63 still remaining as retentionist, although only 24 of these actually carried out the death sentence during 2007. On 18 December 2007, in a historic vote at the UN General Assembly 3, 104 countries adopted a resolution favouring a world-wide moratorium on executions (the resolution was opposed by 52 countries including Myanmar, Zimbabwe and Libya, with the United States also in this company). The international statistics are not fully reliable: China appears to top the league with 470 executions for all causes reported in 2007, but it is possible that the true figure could run into thousands. Second place in the international rankings is held by Iran (207 in 2007), followed by Saudi Arabia (143), Pakistan (135) and the United States (42). In 2007 at least 1252 people were executed across a total of 24 countries 2. There are 10 retentionist countries in the Asian–Pacific region, but in Europe only Belarus continues with this practice. Executions are carried out by various means and can be public or televised, or on other occasions very secretive, with families having difficulty in locating and recovering the body. Officially, executions by stoning have been abolished in Iran but probably still occur: the victim will be buried to the waist and a crowd provided with small stones in order to prolong the suffering 4. In some countries children as young as 13 may be killed judicially 2. Two main lines of argument are commonly advanced 1. The first claims a symbolic type of justification. Drug trafficking is seen as heinous, corrupting of the nations' youth, disruptive of traditional values, often foreign in origin and immensely profitable for its perpetrators. It is a trade which may feed narcoterrorism and at worst threaten the overthrow of the state. Drug dealers kill their victims and willingly shoot down enforcement officers. Secondly, there is the ‘rational’ argument: desperate diseases are seen as requiring desperate remedies. It could well be argued that it is not wrong for the state to take a life if this saves lives. The death penalty will stamp out participation in this evil trade and uniquely deter others from entering the business, it is claimed. How does this play out in practice? Here are a few examples of the outcomes that have resulted. Singapore has enacted a mandatory death penalty for anyone apprehended in possession of more than 15 g of heroin, 30 g of cocaine or 500 g of cannabis 5, quantities which in many other jurisdictions would be seen as more compatible with personal use than intent to supply. Other countries favouring mandatory judicial killings include Brunei, India, Laos, Malaysia and North Korea 3. Meanwhile, China marked UN Anti-Drugs day with the mass execution of 55 drug dealers carried out in just 2 weeks of June 2006 6. In 2008, off the coast of Yemen, the US Navy intercepted a fishing boat which was found to have 1.5 tonnes of hashish on board. The Americans handed the 12 Iranian crew members over to the Yemeni authorities, who condemned one of these men to death and gave 25-year prison sentences to the other 11 defendants. The prosecution has appealed against this supposed leniency and demanded that the death sentence should be handed out to all concerned 7. It is difficult, if not impossible, to give anything approaching an annual world estimate for the number of drug traffickers executed, but in some countries they account for the majority of all executions and are increasing in number. Those who oppose the use of the death penalty for drug trafficking will also probably build their case on two lines of argument. First, and while admitting the impossibility of controlled comparisons, they are likely to contend that the death penalty as applied to these offences is not, and cannot rationally be expected to be, an effective instrument of deterrence. There are numerous examples of the trade in drugs thriving in the face of the most draconian penalties, for the simple reason that it is the poor and replaceable ‘mules’ and runners who are likely to be caught and executed, while the major dealers are immune to prosecution and bribe or shoot their way out. Not only is there a dearth of tangible evidence as to efficacy, but a large body of research on the general issue of deterrents suggests strongly that likelihood of detection is a more important deterrent than intensity of punishment 8. Drunk driving provides a telling example: the appearance of this potentially lethal behaviour requires not the death penalty, but suspension of licensing coupled with high-profile policing. In Afghanistan it appears that the opium farmers not only pay 10% of their profits to the Taliban but may also pay an informal 10% tax to the police and then operate with relative impunity from any interference by enforcement agencies 9. Research on the complex interactive business of drug control has, over recent years, become increasingly sophisticated 10-12. However, although there are good research-based reasons 11 to doubt the likely efficacy of the death penalty as a national contribution to control, it is difficult to identify a research strategy which could put the question to the test conclusively. The second argument likely to be employed by the abolitionists is that judicial killings for this type of crime are an offence against human rights. The three current international drug conventions, to which the great majority of nations are signatories, make no reference to use of the death penalty. However, the UN Safeguards 1, a statement which seeks to protect the rights of those facing the death penalty, ruled that ‘capital punishment may be imposed only for the more serious crimes, it being understood that its scope should not go beyond intentional crime with lethal or other extremely severe consequences’7. Authoritative legal interpretation of that statement is likely 13 to support the view that the death penalty for drug trafficking is a violation of human rights—trafficking is no more a proximate and inevitable cause of death than is the trade in motorcars or the sale of tobacco. If the evidence for and against the efficacy, logic and ethicality of execution for drug trafficking is put to any uncorrupted jury, what would one expect to be their verdict? This editorial dares to assert that, beyond reasonable doubt, that jury would find for specific abolition. No assumption as to consensus is needed, however, to argue that addiction scientists, from many different backgrounds, have the authority to contribute to this debate. Some, perhaps the majority, may want to speak out in support of the abolitionist cause spurred by the belief that silence in such circumstances is too near connivance. Conjointly, the world community of addiction science and scholarship has a powerful voice and one which deserves to be heard on this matter. Addiction is therefore sending a copy of this editorial with a covering letter to a number of relevant national and international professional organizations, and to the editors of all 67 journals that are members of ISAJE (the International Society for Addiction Journal Editors). Readers of this journal who wish to make personal representations of this type may like to have the following contact advice: Secretary General of the UN: UN Headquarters First Avenue at 46th Street, New York, NY 10017; President of the UN International Narcotics Control Board: secretariat@incb.org; Director General of WHO: chaibf@who.int. It would be helpful if any messages could be copied to Addiction: National Addiction Centre, 4 Windsor Walk, London, UK; e-mail: louisa@addictionjournal.org. The authors of this editorial do not believe that they are subject to any conflicts of interest relevant to the present editorial. As members of Addiction's editorial staff, each of them provides a general statement on conflict of interest on the journal's website: http://www.addictionjournal.org/ethicalpolicy.asp" @default.
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• W2159780401 title "Drug trafficking: time to abolish the death penalty" @default.
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