Stand Up! Shout Out! Sunday Aug. 10th SF Civic Center Stand Up! Shout Out! and be heard, on Sunday August 10th the In Touch Collective brings you a different kind of dance in which we will be fucusing on the recent laws and bills that have been presented to us as we take in refreshing beats of the djs to help keep your mood. This will be an activist dance in which we will be gaining not the attention of average ravers or clubbers but we will be demanding the attention of those who do not know about the recent laws that have recently come into play.
The gathering will be held at the San Francisco Civic Center courtyard, outside under the beautiful sky from 12 noon until 8pm that night. We are fully permitted with the City of San Francisco and this will be a 100% free gathering as this is a 100% non profit event. We have setup a donation to help us pay for the sound permit which is costing us a chunk of change. We will be accepting donations at the gathering and we also have setup a PayPal account online at the following link. If we can even get $1 from each person it will fully pay for the sound permits. 100% of the donations go to the permits.
Click here to make a donation to Stand Up! Shout Out! through PayPal.
www.paypal.com/xclick/business=InTouchCollective@hotmail.com&item_name=in+touch+rave+act+protest&no_note=1&tax=0¤cy_code=USD
As mentioned previously we will also will have a great lineup of djs to help keep you enlightened throught the day which include:
St.John
Vallerie Sparks
Dragn'fly
Ron Reeser
The Doctor
...and about 5 more to be announced very soon.
Between the music you will be educated by public speakers giving short speeches that will help give a better understanding of the Illicit Drug Anti-Proliferation Act to those who are not in the know, as well as its wrongful association to the Amber Alert child abduction bill the two of which have absolutely not a thing to do with eachother. Our goal here is not to reverse any laws, we need to be realistic and we must inform and educate before we can make a change. We will be attracting our usual class of culture but more importantly we will be reaching out to the average 9 - 5 job kind of person, the tourist or visitor to our city who stumbles upon us, the banker going to get his afternoon coffee and sees us, and most importantly all the political figures of whose offices we will be dancing outside of in the courtyard. We need a diverse group of people to attend because this extention of the R.A.V.E. Act hurts not just raves but bars, concerts, clubs, bbq's, even the birthday party you had with a musical performance at it. This bill was passed without having a hearing, without even being debated over and this is wrong. It is up to us to Stand Up and Shout Out.
What we need from you is to tell every single soul you come in contact with to attend this gathering. A lot depends on how many of you participate because we will be calling on every last local news channel, newspaper and radio news station in the Bay Area to come out and give us the attention we will be demanding to help get our word out to the public. So the more participants we have, the better this will look and the more attention we will gain. We urge you to make signs and picketts baring your feelings towards these new laws.
We do ask you to please remember that the media will be here and every last one of you are representing an entire culture so please represent us respectfully, leaving home your drug paraphanellia, pipes, and t shirts that have a big pot leaf in the middle of them. If you are seen drug dealing, doing drugs or being healvily intoxicated, the on site law enforcement will be notified and you will be escorted off the premesis or even worse be arrested. We are being very strict on this rule and it will be enforced during the entire gathering from begining to end. No joke, No excpetions, we are not liying about this so if you plan to come here for that you better make plans on staying home or face consequences. We want to give the media and the public a good impression. Those of you whose senses arise to this only to do drugs please just stay home and help us out by not coming. This is not a rave, this is a dance with education and information being dispensed as well as good vibes, good opinions and good beats.
This thread will be updated very soon so please check back.
If you have any questions or comments or you would like to add a major idea to the event please email to InTouchCollective@hotmail.com or AIM myself at OTayblTwiztrO or Daniel at dmfan1981.
lost all the parties can someone tell me where some parties are in country somewhere ...i have had enough need to go find one the bigger the better ...please please please
Glastonbury alternative Hello, I believe that the alternative glastonbury has been either cancelled or something?
If any has any details or party lines please could you kindly e-mail them to lokeymerl@hotmail.com?
cheers
merl
UK: Parents tell the Commons to legalise all drugs – April 2002 Parents tell the Commons to legalise all drugs
by The Guardian
Copyright: The Guardian
Parents whose children have suffered from heroin and other drug abuse told MPs yesterday it was time to legalise all drugs.
Fulton Gillespie, whose son Scott died from a heroin overdose two years ago, told the Commons home affairs select committee inquiry into the drug laws that he believed "if you try to regulate supply there is no point in leaving the power station in the hands of the criminals".
Hope Humphreys, whose son was jailed for 2 years for supplying ecstasy to fellow university students, said the drug laws succeeded only in making criminals out of people who were not criminals.
"Most students like to smoke cannabis and take ecstasy and most do not have a problem with drugs. But they do have a problem with the law. My son went to prison because he told the truth that he was getting the ecstasy for a friend." The evidence from parents who do not support the drug laws came in the
committee's last session of its inquiry. It is expected that its report, to be published later in the spring, will endorse a more liberal approach to the drug laws.
Other parents and those who run support services for the families of drug addicts told MPs how difficult it was to get access to help and services, such as residential rehabilitation for heroin addicts.
Mr Gillespie said: "There are very few things in life that concentrate the mind more than losing a child. Until my son became involved in drugs, I was one of those people who thought the answer was just to build more prisons.
"I have given this a lot of thought and come to the conclusion that the only way that would work would be to legalise all drugs."
He said his son had funded his habit by stealing and had spent five weeks in prison without drugs. On his release, as the coroner found, his body could not take his normal dose. "I am concerned that he is dead because of the law," said Mr Gillespie.
He did not believe that legalising all drugs would increase consumption. "The executive should take control, regulate supply and make sure it is clean because the kids are going to use it anyway."
Research published today explodes the myth that the police rarely take formal action over cannabis offences, with the 69,000 people cautioned or convicted for possession in 1999 representing one in seven of offenders dealt with for all crimes. The study, by South Bank University's criminal policy research unit,
shows there has been a tenfold increase in the number of possession offences since the mid-1970s.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/
UK: Happy clubbers care little for MPs’ call to downgrade ECSTASY – May 2002 Happy clubbers care little for MPs' call to downgrade ecstasy
By The Independent - 25 May 2002
Copyright: The Independent
More than a decade after MDMA became commonplace, official thinking still lags behind the realities of its recreational use.
The music is so loud that your organs vibrate. As your eyes become used to the lasers and dry ice, the impression is of slow motion. Everyone seems to be walking on the moon, they seem tactile ... happy.
It is a brewery's nightmare: a London club where almost everyone is on methylenedioxy- metamphetamine – MDMA, ecstasy or E; the drug that a Home Affairs Select Committee last week recommended downgrading from a class A to a class B controlled substance.
A reduction from A to B means little in practice – the maximum penalty for possession is simply reduced from seven years to five. But the message sent out by the mostly white, middle-aged and middle-class MPs is being seen by some as groundbreaking. Was this a signal that, contrary to the tabloids' view, ecstasy was not such a corrupter of our children?
As an exercise in canvassing opinion, the people in this London club hardly represented a paradigm for empirical research. Those questioned were invariably, in their own words, "off their heads". Yes, they said, ecstasy should be legalised. It's wonderful. And, by the way, you're a really lovely man.
This is how ecstasy-users talk. Patented in 1913 by the drug company Merck as a dieting aid that was never marketed, MDMA gives feelings of empathy, warmth and euphoria. Violence is almost unheard of in a venue where ecstasy is the drug of choice.
MDMA comes as powder, which can be snorted, or more usually as a pill. The pills, costing as little now as £5 or less each, usually carry a logo. The current favourite is the Mitsubishi car company badge, but in the past there have been doves, dollar signs, Mercedes, Rolling Stones lips and many others.
A pill takes about 40 minutes to work and can last for one to four hours. It raises the temperature, increases the heart rate and dilates pupils. It suppresses the appetite, wards off tiredness and, paradoxically, makes users want either to dance or sit quietly in, they say, ecstasy.
"You simply can't explain to people just what it's like," said Luke, 30, a smiling computer analyst who is massaging his girlfriend's back. "You feel wonderful, everyone is your friend, all your social inhibitions drop and you find yourself talking to – and really befriending – complete strangers. For a while, the world is how it should be."
These clubbers are not impressed with reclassifying ecstasy. They took a risk when the penalty for possession was seven years. And they will take the same risk now that it is five.
"I doubt if anyone gave the news a second thought," said Luke's girlfriend, Anna, 24. "Ecstasy is everywhere and it has been for more than a decade. The police know it, but people on E cause them no trouble at all, particularly compared with people on alcohol. I don't know anyone who's had a bad time on it but I know lots of people who have been sick, got hurt or made a fool of themselves on drink. As long as you're caught only carrying enough for yourself, you're more likely to get just a caution these days."
Commander Brian Paddick, whose relaxed drugs policy in Brixton, south London, caused a political storm, said in his evidence to the Home Affairs Select Committee: "If I felt that my officers were going into nightclubs looking for people who were in possession of ecstasy then I would say to them, and I would say publicly, that they are wasting valuable police resources ... I would say there are far more important things which cause real harm to the community."
The people who really need to worry are the dealers, but they show no sign of concern in this club. You can spot them in huddles, selling to eager clubbers. Pills? they ask, unsolicited. If you can see them, so can the club's security. But a club without E is like a wake. On sale here are Mitsubishis at £5 from one dealer, and tablets with a logo like an elliptical triangle at £7 from another.
"These guys perform a service because they take a risk," said Andy, a 27-year-old mechanic with wildly dilated pupils. "This stuff should be legal but they have to take a risk to get it to people who want it. And we all want it."
Professor John Henry, a clinical toxicologist at St Mary's Hospital, London, told the select committee: "I personally think that ecstasy is relatively safe in the short term. The long-term risk is to my mind unknown at present, although as each year goes by I get relatively more sanguine about the risk rather than less. I accept there is still a great deal of uncertainty about the long-term effects on the brain. In terms of addictiveness, it is very low."
Half a million people take ecstasy each weekend but death is rare. In 2000, 27 people died out of an estimated 55 million pills taken. This was just 2.2 per cent of drug-related deaths. In 1999, 754 people died taking heroin, 87 from cocaine, and hundreds of thousands from using alcohol and tobacco.
Release, a drugs charity, is not impressed with reclassification of MDMA. Kevin Flemen, its deputy director, said: "Reducing it to class B does nothing for either prevention or damage control. We would like to see it legalised and regulated. It should be sold in a pharmaceutically safe form at chemists – once users had to queue up for it with people waiting for their pile cream, it would soon look a lot less glamorous."
So, does reclassification represent a veiled acceptance? Chris Mullin, the committee chairman, says it does not. Instead, the intention was to put some distance between it, and heroin and cocaine, a distinction intended to help educate young people against drugs.
"This is clearly not as harmful as heroin or crack," he said. "But it can still be a dangerous drug and it is not one that we would like to see legalised."
http://www.independent.co.uk/
World: Research linking ECSTASY to brain damage ‘flawed’ – April 2002 Research linking ecstasy to brain damage 'flawed'
By Annanova
Copyright: Annanova
Scientific evidence that ecstasy damages the brain is fundamentally flawed and has misled politicians and the public, a report claims.
An inquiry by New Scientist magazine concluded that many of the findings published in respected journals cannot be trusted.
Similar uncertainty surrounds evidence that ecstasy impairs mental performance, according to New Scientist. In the majority of tests of mental agility, ecstasy users performed as well as non-users.
Marc Laruelle, an expert on brain scanning at Columbia University, New York City, said: "All the papers have very significant scientific limitations that make me uneasy."
He pointed out that the chemical probes used in ecstasy brain scans do not always stick solely to serotonin transporters.
Psychologist Andrew Parrott, of the University of East London, found ecstasy users outperformed non-users in tests requiring them to rotate complex shapes in their mind's eye.
Ecstasy users did perform worse when learning new verbal information. But according to Mr Parrott their performance still lay well within the range of what counts as normal.
At the centre of the controversy are scans which allegedly show that ecstasy destroys nerve cells involved in the production and transport of serotonin, a vital brain chemical.
Serotonin allows neurons to communicate with each other across nerve connections called synapses. It is involved in a wide range of functions including memory, sleep, sex, appetite, and primarily, mood.
In an editorial, the magazine said: "Our investigation suggests the experiments are so irretrievably flawed that the scientific community risks haemorrhaging credibility if it continues to let them inform public policy."
New Scientist says it is an open secret that some researchers who failed to find impairment in ecstasy users had trouble getting their findings published. The Lancet medical journal has declined to comment on the report.
http://www.ananova.com/
World: Drug lords could ‘ruin’ Jamaica – March 2002 Drug lords could 'ruin' Jamaica
By BBC News - Tuesday, 12 March, 2002
Copyright: BBC News
The Jamaican Minister of National Security and Justice, Dr Peter Phillips has claimed that the survival of Jamaica could be called into question if his government cannot curb the power of drug barons in the country.
Reports say that Jamaica is bleeding to death with more than 1,100 murders recorded last year and 100 tonnes of cocaine trans-shipped to western markets.
Dr Peter Philips told Tim Sebastian for BBC HARDtalk that the government is putting a new strategy in place to try and tackle drug related murders, but the process would be slow.
"There is no instant solution, there is no magic wand but we have tried to outline a strategy forward," he said.
"It's going to take time, resources and will, but we dare not fail because if we do, the survival of the country is going to be brought into question."
A question of strength
Dr Phillips went on to deny rumours that the Jamaican Government does not have the will or the strength to break the drug lords power, arguing that Jamaica will follow the example set by the Bahamas.
The number of murders in the Bahamas has fallen by 50% since June 2001 following a government round up of drug lords.
The Jamaican Government has also been criticised over the alleged close connection between politicians and drug barons.
In April 2001, the Jamaican Finance Minister Omar Davies and two cabinet colleagues were seen mourning at the funeral of Willie "Haggart" Moore, an infamous gangster.
Police links
Dr Phillips claimed that drug gangs can no longer depend on political protection from politicians at the highest level of government.
However he did admit that there are probably some "residual connections" left over from when political and drug ties were strong in the 1970s.
"If you asked me whether or not there are elements within the police force that may be compromised I would say I believe there would be," he said.
"If you asked me whether or not within the political system as a whole there may be persons who have links that are too close or which may be compromised, I'd say the probability exists."
Dr Phillips also defended the Jamaican police force over its so called trigger happy attitude.
In the year 2000, 140 people were killed by Jamaican police, the highest ratio of police killings reported anywhere in the world.
"Minimal force"
Dr Phillips called for the police force to be better trained to deal with armed criminals and ensure "the use of force is minimal".
He also launched an attack on a report by the international human rights organisation, Amnesty International which accused the Jamaican police force of abusing human rights.
"Amnesty has developed a particular view of the police force," he said.
"It would be far from me to suggest that everything is perfect regarding the application of force but on the other side we have numbers of police who are subject to direct attacks."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/
UK: Police chief’s unorthodox approach – March 2002 Police chief's unorthodox approach
By BBC News - Friday, 15 March, 2002
Copyright: BBC News
An openly gay, Oxford-educated liberal who pioneered a controversial approach to drug laws may not seem like the most obvious candidate for one of Britain's toughest police jobs.
Add to the mix comments like "the concept of anarchism has always appealed to me" and many people may wonder how Brian Paddick was able to join the force at all.
But while the Lambeth commander has no shortage of critics, he seems to have won an equal amount of support from the residents of one of London's more 'difficult' boroughs.
Faced with high levels of crime, including drug abuse, Mr Paddick has been praised by many people for his determination to look at unorthodox solutions - most famously his controversial decision not to prosecute people caught with small amounts of cannabis.
The chief has declared the approach a huge success. He said it has improved community relations, saved police time and led to a "dramatic increase" in the number of arrests for hard drugs.
Reputation
Mr Paddick joined the Metropolitan Police 25 years ago after leaving Oxford University and has since earned a reputation as one its most modernising senior officers.
He first worked in Lambeth in 1982 as a beat officer in Brixton and has seen the type of drugs for sale on its streets change over time.
Mr Paddick says cannabis was the only widely available drug when he first started, but the more serious problems of heroin and crack cocaine soon followed.
The high level of drug use and abuse in Brixton and the surrounding area led Mr Paddick to consider solutions which have put him directly at odds with his bosses and mid-market tabloid newspapers.
'Blind eye'
Zero-tolerance proponents saw red when he announced a six-month pilot scheme under which people caught with cannabis would not be arrested.
Instead they were issued with an on-the-spot warning and had their drugs confiscated, 'freeing' police to concentrate on the fight against hard drugs.
The ranks of critics swelled further when Mr Paddick said arresting people for possession of ecstasy was "a waste of valuable police resources" and that he would rather "turn a blind eye" to the use of cocaine.
Mr Paddick's claims that recreational drug use was not a priority saw the commander rebuked by Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir John Stevens.
He was also forced to explain the views were his and not those of the force.
But for Jane Betts, whose daughter Leah was killed by ecstasy six years ago, the damage was already done.
She said: "I'm sick of senior police officers who are just worried about balancing their books. They don't give a stuff about the kids on the street."
'Beyond redemption'
Controversy has not dampened Mr Paddick's determination to bring in reform, though.
He has become a regular contributor to the www.urban75.com website, where he has admitted that his colleagues in the force consider him "beyond redemption".
He recently created a furore when he posted his views on anarchism.
"The concept of anarchism has always appealed to me," the police chief wrote.
"The idea of the innate goodness of the individual that is corrupted by society or the system.
"It is a theoretical argument but I am not sure everyone would behave well if there were no laws and no system."
Mr Paddick used the site to post other views, recently offering the thought: "The bottom line is, screw the dealers, help the addicts."
He also denounced zero-tolerance treatment of crime as being tantamount to creating a "police state".
The comments have provoked a strong response from other website users, perhaps encouraging him to carry on speaking out when others would choose to remain silent.
Among those in favour, 'Hatboy' is typical: "I think it's great that you say you don't have set ideas on how to tackle the crime problems in Brixton...Often the most enlightened people are the ones who can say 'I don't know'."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/
World: ECSTASY link to long-term brain damage – March 2002 Ecstasy link to long-term brain damage
By The University of Adelaide - Monday, March 4 2002
Copyright: The University of Adelaide
DISTURBING evidence is emerging that the increasingly popular drug ecstasy can be linked to users suffering long-term brain damage.
University of Adelaide researchers have found that ecstasy taken on a few occasions could cause severe damage to brain cells, with the potential to cause future memory loss or psychological problems.
Dr Rod Irvine, an internationally regarded ecstasy expert from the University's Department of Clinical and Experimental Pharmacology, says with 7% of 17-year-olds reporting use of ecstasy, major health problems could be expected in the future.
"For many years it has been known from animal experiments that small doses of ecstasy-even if only taken on only a few occasions-can cause severe damage to certain brain cells," he says. "More recently, evidence has started to accumulate suggesting that this damage may also occur in humans. Brain scans and psychological assessment of ecstasy users has been used to obtain this information.
"If our suspicions are proved correct, it will mean many of our young people will have memory loss or psychological problems in the future."
Dr Irvine's research on brain damage caused by ecstasy shows that the drug seems to work mainly through its effects on one type of brain cell, and even through one molecule in those cells. It also seems likely that the way the body reacts chemically to ecstasy is important in producing adverse effects, as is the surrounding temperature, which can lead to users overheating.
Adelaide's reputation as having the highest per capita death rate from ecstasy in Australia-and perhaps even the world-forms another component of Dr Irvine's research.
Dr Irvine is looking at the shorter-term consequences of ecstasy "overdoses", and has established that the high rate of death is due to a different strain of ecstasy appearing on the Adelaide market in the mid1990s.
"Normal" ecstasy contains the pharmacological ingredient known as MDMA as its main ingredient, but the Adelaide strain often contained no MDMA but rather a more potent chemical known as PMA.
"PMA hasn't been around since the early 1970s when it was responsible for the deaths of several people in Ontario, Canada, and now it's reappeared here in Adelaide," Dr Irvine says. "We don't know where the PMA came from, but we do know that it has been prevalent in Adelaide since the mid 1990s."
http://www.adelaide.edu.au/
UK: Police let-off drugs testing – March 2002 Police let-off drugs testing
by Daily Mirror
Copyright: Daily Mirror
Scotland Yard has quietly dropped plans for officers to be randomly drug-tested because of fears that hundreds would be caught. The Metropolitan Police has put the controversial issue on the "back-burner", according to one senior source.
Britain's most powerful policeman, Commissioner Sir John Stevens supports testing, but accepts that as much as one-third of the 26,000-strong force could find themselves at risk from detection. Police chiefs have been studying the issue for the last five years. But Scotland Yard confirmed yesterday: "There are no plans to introduce random drug-testing for officers."
A senior officer said: "We have enough difficulties increasing police numbers without adding to our burden by losing those taking illegal substances. "Drug-taking by officers is not something being hidden under the carpet. Action is taken if there is evidence of drug abuse.
"Sir John accepts that many officers - especially the younger ones - take drugs. In his day, alcohol was the choice of recreational 'drug' favoured by those in the police, but society has changed."
The Yard, and the 43 forces across England and Wales, currently have no powers to make an officer take a drugs test. Legal experts believe compulsory testing is a minefield and that it may never be introduced by police forces.
http://www.mirror.co.uk/
US: Ad campaign targets notion of ‘love drug’ – March 2002 Ad campaign targets notion of 'love drug'
by USA TODAY
Copyright: USA TODAY
A national advertising campaign that debuts today will try to scrape the shiny, happy gloss from the Ecstasy drug craze.
The Partnership for a Drug-Free America's first-ever focus on Ecstasy, as seen through a series of public service advertisements on TV and in newspapers, represents a watershed moment in the national response to the club drug. Experts say Ecstasy is taking root in youth culture and an aggressive, concerted campaign is needed to unsell the drug to a growing number of captivated youth.
The ads will confront the notions of Ecstasy as a harmless ''love drug'' whose benefits far outweigh the risks.
One ad targeted at parents portrays a grieving father, Jim Heird, whose daughter, Danielle, 21, of Las Vegas, died the third time she used Ecstasy.
''I would've given anything for some warning signs. I would have moved. I would have locked her up. I don't care,'' Heird says in the commercial. ''A parent's not supposed to survive their children. It's not the scheme of things.''
In another ad, a coroner reads Danielle Heird's autopsy report while a photo collage of a happy, healthy Danielle crosses the screen.
One of a second set of commercials, which is aimed at teenagers, depicts a dance rave in which a girl on Ecstasy lies crumpled on the floor while her friends continue dancing around her. Another ad depicts a house party where kids high on Ecstasy make out and massage one another. When one boy becomes ill and crawls into a bathroom, a friend merely shuts the bathroom door. The tag lines at the end of each ad read, ''Ecstasy: Where's the love?''
The drug, 3-4 methylenedioxy-methamphetamine, or MDMA, was initially used in psychotherapy. It emerged as a recreational drug on college campuses in the mid-1980s, says Glen Hanson, acting director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse in Bethesda, Md. It spread through the rave party scene in the early 1990s.
''It's not just a little fad. It's a very disturbing trend,'' says Mitchell Rosenthal, president of the Phoenix House Foundation, the nation's largest drug-treatment provider.
In a new survey of teen drug use, the partnership found that teens view the drug as only slightly more dangerous than alcohol, tobacco, marijuana and inhalants. Drug experts worry Ecstasy will spread like cocaine did in the late 1970s and early 1980s, spawning a generation of addicts faster than health officials could issue warnings.
''By then, we were so deep in the well, it took a long time to climb back out,'' says Stephen Pasierb, president of the partnership. It wasn't until college basketball star Len Bias died of a cocaine overdose that teens began to see the scary side of cocaine use, Pasierb says.
Now, as with cocaine, teens seem unaware or unimpressed by the growing body of scientific evidence that Ecstasy is dangerous.
Scientists have studied extensively Ecstasy's effect on laboratory animals. Human clinical studies are underway, says George Ricaurte, an associate professor of neurology at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.
http://www.usatoday.com/
World: China ‘smashes’ heroin ring – February 2002 China 'smashes' heroin ring
By BBC News - Tuesday, 5 February, 2002
Copyright: BBC News
Chinese police say they have made their largest ever seizure of heroin and arrested 21 people involved in a major smuggling ring.
State media also reported the Burmese authorities had shot dead one of China's most wanted drug traffickers following a joint operation.
China last year pledged to step up co-operation with neighbouring countries in the fight against the drug trade but officials say trafficking remains rampant in border areas.
Police in China's south-western Yunnan province hailed the seizures as a victory for cross-border co-operation.
Gun battle
They said Burmese police involved in a joint operation shot dead drug trafficker Liu Ming during a firefight last week.
State media said Liu was responsible for smuggling half-a-tonne of heroin into China over the past eight years. His gang was also found to have amassed an armoury including machineguns and an artillery piece.
His death follows the smashing of another gang smuggling drugs from Burma to Guangdong province near the Hong Kong border.
A routine check on a truck in Yunnan led to the discovery of 673kg (1,480 pounds) of heroin and the arrests of 21 people, 12 of them from Hong Kong.
Rampant trade
State media said the arrests had dealt a blow to the drugs trade between Yunnan and Burma's Golden Triangle region.
But the head of narcotics control in Yunnan told the China Daily newspaper that drug trafficking remained rampant in border areas and only global efforts could stop it.
He said progress had been made in closing some drug-producing laboratories inside the Golden Triangle following a conference in Beijing last year, when China, Burma, Thailand and Laos promised to step up joint action against drugs.
But suspicions remain about Burma's determination to crack down on the lucrative trade.
Its scale was highlighted by figures showing that seizures of heroin in China doubled last year to around 13 tonnes, along with almost five tonnes of the drug ice or meth-amphetamine, which is also regularly smuggled in from Burma.
Chinese police this month launched a six-month campaign which they say will target nightclubs, karaoke bars and other places described as havens for drug dealers.
China officially has 900,000 registered drug users but experts say the real figure is far higher, with heroin, ice and ecstasy widely available.
China arrested 73,000 people for drug-related offences last year.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/
UK: Electronic dog sniffs out drugs – February 2002 Electronic dog sniffs out drugs
By BBC News - Monday, 25 February, 2002
Night clubbers have been brought to face-to-face with the latest weapon in the fight against drugs - an electronic "sniffer dog".
The machine can detect the slightest trace of any chemical from Class A drugs to explosives.
Up until now, it has been used mainly by customs officers - but Bedfordshire Police are hoping it can help them crack down on drugs in the county's clubs and pubs.
The machine was taken to a nightspot in Dunstable on Saturday where it was used to check visitors.
Inspector Mark Holbourn, from Bedfordshire Police, said: "If people know that when they go out to licensed premises they could be checked for drugs, they might think twice.
One arrest
"I think it's been very successful so far."
The £28,000 machine, known as a trace detector, operates by vaporising particles taken by swab from a club-goer's hand or clothing.
It is so sensitive that it can pick up minute quantities of drugs.
If a read-out shows any suspicious substance, officers can carry out further searches or questioning.
Figures have not yet been compiled for the weekend's operation.
But at its first outing in pubs and clubs before Christmas, the detector helped secure one arrest for possession of cocaine.
Police hope it will help them spot people in possession of a range of drugs, including Ecstasy and the "date-rape" drug Rohypnol.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/
UK: Drug laws revolution set for UK – February 2002 Drug laws revolution set for UK
by The Observer
Copyright: The Observer
Cannabis should be decriminalised in an Amsterdam-style revolution on the streets of Britain, an influential group of MPs will recommend in a landmark report.
A seven-month investigation by the Home Affairs Select Committee, conducted at Downing Street's request, concludes that ecstasy should be downgraded and prosecutions for possession of cannabis ended.
The report, to be published this spring, will be seen as an authoritative milestone in the fierce debate over legalisation. It comes as cannabis treatments are to be prescribed on the NHS to multiple sclerosis sufferers, in a radical step to be revealed tomorrow.
The Government will ask its medicines watchdog, the National Institute of Clinical Excellence (Nice), to issue guidelines for doctors on prescribing two cannabis derivatives - one a capsule, the other a spray used under the tongue - made by drug companies which have isolated the active ingredients of marijuana.
Neither results in a 'high', and patients will not be given the option of smoking street cannabis. But the Home Office is watching the move with interest. 'There is a general feeling that this would be part of the process of breaking down the barriers of resistance to the way cannabis is treated,' said one Whitehall source.
Downing Street, which has been adamant that there will be no decriminalisation of soft drugs, is expected to give a cautious welcome to the report but to oppose ecstasy, a class A drug, being downgraded to Class B.
Home Secretary David Blunkett recently downgraded cannabis from B to C, which still carries a two-year sentence for possession but in effect means personal use rather than dealing will be tolerated. The committee backs a further step to a model similar to that in Holland, where dope is as openly consumed in cafes as coffee.
It also wants wider prescription of heroin on the NHS to addicts, a greater emphasis on 'harm reduction strategies' and a review of drug treatment in prisons.
A confidential report is circulating among senior officers at Scotland Yard on the success of a pilot scheme under which police informally caution people caught in possession of cannabis and then let them go, as opposed to a formal caution at a police station. During the six-month scheme, in Lambeth, London, police gained 1,400 hours of working time, and a significant rise in arrests for Class A drugs was recorded. Reformers will seize on the news as proof that relaxed approaches to cannabis can actually help fight crime.
A source close to the committee said: 'The chairman, Chris Mullin MP, is set on these recommendations, and the majority of the committee is behind him.' Two members are thought to harbour more conservative views.
Blair has made clear he does not want Labour to be seen as 'soft on drugs', limiting potential for legalisation. However, insiders expect that, even if Blunkett insists on cannabis remaining a Class C drug, police will be told informally not to prosecute for possession.
Lord Falconer, the Housing Minister and a close Blair ally, will meet the Home Office Ministers John Denham and Bob Ainsworth on Tuesday to 'brainstorm' ideas for drug law reform.
Roger Howard, chief executive of the government-funded charity Drugscope, said: 'For such an influential body to be suggesting such significant reforms is indicative of the pressing need for change.'
But John Ramsey, a toxicologist at St George's Hospital Medical School in London, questioned whether heroin on prescription would help to break an addict's 'habit of injection'. He added: 'We should not be telling people that MDMA (ecstasy) is now considered a safe drug.'
The Department of Health will publish a consultation paper tomorrow on cannabis derivatives dronabinol, made by Solvay Healthcare, and a cannabis-based medicinal extract spray made by GW Pharmaceuticals. Both are still undergoing trials and are unlikely to be licensed for use until 2004.
http://www.observer.co.uk/
UK: Cover-up Over the Rise in Ecstasy Use – January 2002 Cover-up claimed as ecstasy use 'soars to 2 million pills a week'
by The Observer
Copyright: The Observer
Two million ecstasy pills a week are taken in Britain, four times more than the Government has admitted publicly, warns a confidential intelligence report seen by The Observer.
Official estimates maintain that only half a million tablets of the controversial dance drug are taken every week in pubs and clubs.
A classified study by Customs and Excise, dramatically raising the figure, is revealed as police are asking the Government to downgrade ecstasy, giving it the same legal status as cannabis.
There are already rising fears that the drug may have harmful long-term effects to users' health. It was connected to a record number of deaths last year.
MPs and drug experts were gravely concerned by the Customs and Excise findings this weekend. They cited them as an example of government secrecy on drug policy.
Meanwhile, Scotland Yard is struggling to explain a massive rise in seizures of Class A drugs. Figures from forensic laboratories delivered to senior officers last week show that seizures of large shipments of cocaine have trebled and those of heroin have doubled in the past year.
'We're still trying to work out why this has happened,' said a senior Met source.
These figures and the new estimate of ecstasy use will fuel claims that drug availability and consumption have spun wildly out of control.
'Any suspicion that the Government is withholding information such as this must be condemned,' said Oliver Letwin, the Shadow Home Secretary. 'If we are to formulate rational policies to reduce drug dependence, it is essential the Govern-ment gives us accurate statistics.'
The intelligence report, prepared last year for a police service that cannot be named for legal reasons, says: 'A Customs and Excise study has suggested that two million ecstasy pills are consumed each week. Seizure figures, meanwhile, were around 6.3 million 100mg doses in 1999' - 6 per cent of the estimated amount of the drug used.
The report says there are 430,000 users, who spend a total of UKP300m a year on ecstasy, perhaps taking between 10 and 15 pills a night.
John Ramsey, head of toxicology at St George's Hospital in London, said: 'I cannot believe that there is anything more than a linear relationship between the number of deaths and the number of users. If traffic doubled, road deaths probably would.'
He said 27 people died in the UK as a result of taking ecstasy last year, a rise of two-thirds in 12 months.
Campaigners said the huge level of consumption must be tackled by greater understanding, not criminalisation. Roger Howard, head of Drugscope, a government-backed charity, said: 'If these new figures are valid, the ecstasy problem seems considerably larger than the Government has estimated.
'It is essential that all the information the Government has on the scale of the problem is made public.'
A spokeswoman for Customs and Excise denied it was responsible for the report, attributed to it by police intelligence sources. 'We do not recognise the figure you are referring to,' she added.
A Home Office official also denied the Customs estimate existed, and stuck to the old figure of 'half a million tablets a week'.
http://www.observer.co.uk/
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