HaRdCOREhARMREdUCER: INPUD Communication for the EU Commission

Dear Friends,

European INPUD members over the past two years participated in the process for the involvement of civil society in EU drugs policies, organized by the EU Commission. The end of this process - and the beginning of the involvement - is the organization of the first European Civil Society Forum On Drugs in December 2007.

Despite our constant and constructive participation in the preparation of this civil society involvement in EU drugs policies, the European Commission didn't take into account INPUD's application for membership in the European Civil Society Forum On Drugs.

Today the European INPUD Activists Milena Naydenova and Stijn Goossens wrote a letter to the EU Commission to ask an official explanation about the reasons for the exclusion of people who use drugs from the EU Civil Society Forum On Drugs. You can find the letter in attachement.

If you agree with the statements in our letter to the Commission, please spread this message and the letter as widely as possible in your networks (also outside EU) and support our protest in the way you find most proper to make our voices heard anyway.

Information (in chronological order) on the 2 year process for the involvement of civil society in EU drugs policies:

European DU were present at, and participated in the European Conference "Civil Society and Drugs in Europe" (Click to read: Conference conclusions).
The EU Commission then released the Green Paper on the role of Civil Society in Drugs Policy in the European Union and organized an open consultation on this document. 23 European DU and DU organizations together wrote a reply to the EU's Green Paper.
The EU Commission released the Results of the open consultation on The Green Paper on April 18, 2007 and called for civil society organizations to apply for member ship in the European Civil Society Forum On Drugs, to be held in the end of the year 2007.
Finally, on October 31 2007 , the EU Commission released the list with accepted applicants.

Letter to the EU Commission:

November 9^th 2007, Antwerp

Dear Mister Edwards, Madam, Sir, from Unit C2 from EC,

First of all, INPUD-Europe thank you for your formal reply on our application for the EU Civil Society Forum On Drugs.

We also thank the Commission for their intention to make a political debate on the future trends in the EU policies on drugs. Also, we thank the Commission even more for admitting the failure of the current EU policies on drugs.

Still, by the present letter, as a network of civil society activists and organizations, as regular European citizens and most of all as people, most directly affected by the current and consequently – by the future EU drug policies, we would like to know why the good intentions stated in the Green Paper do not correspond to the present decisions of Mr. Edwards' team. To make it more clear we ask the Commission, and Unit C2 in particular, the following concrete questions:

1) Who takes the political responsibility for creating a list of participants for the EU Civil Society Forum On Drugs that completely diverges from the initial goals of the Commission and the Green Paper for bringing those most directly concerned by the drugs problems more closely into the policy process on drugs at EU level. Even more - we insist to know the reason why there is no Drug Users' Community representatives invited to the Forum. No need to clarify that we refuse to accept the competence of a Civil Society Forum On DRUGS, formed by a team that does not acknowledge the need to include all main stakeholders in the debates.

2) Who takes the political responsibility for protecting and keeping the status quo of policies on drugs that bring only disease, crime, corruption, political and social instability. The obvious reluctance of Mr. Eduards' team to invite the main party in the gravest problem facing society and governments today – the drug users to the discussions, even when there is a gap of four more slots to be filled leaves no room for another conclusions.

3) And, in connection with all said above: Who takes the political responsibility for protecting and trying to keep the status quo of the evidence-based proved most cost-inefficient policies on drugs. Is it really necessary enormous part of our taxes to be spent on a Civil Society Forum that doesn't meet the criteria set by the Commission itself in the Green Paper and later on – on incarceration, marginalization, oppression – e.g. on declaring a war on a big part of our own citizens, instead of having the more civilized, more effective, better working, cost-efficient health approach to the problem.

Like regular european citizens who address a legitimate official institution - the EU Commission - we demand a concrete answer on each one of the questions above in the terms appointed by the EU regulations.

Sincerely,

Milena Naydenova,
Stijn Goossens,

INPUD vzw
www.INPUD.org

Stijn Goossens
Executive Director

International Network Of People Who Use Drugs

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