international cooperation and a quick transfer of legal documents for
launching prosecution.
Punishability of Drug-related crimes:
The Uniform Convention institutes the punishment for drug-related
crimes and obliges member-countries to take specific actions when crimes
that are recognized as punishable by the Convention are committed
intentionally. Serious crimes should be punished by imprisonment or some
other form of deprivation of freedom. Intentional crimes which are
punishable include: the cultivation and production, manufacture,
extraction, preparation, storage, offer, offer with commercial intentions,
distribution, purchase, sale, delivery on any conditions, drug-pushing,
dispatch, transit re-dispatch, shipping, and importation and exportation of
narcotics. Each of these crimes, if committed in more than one country,
must be considered as a separate crime. Intentional complicity in any of
these crimes, participation in a community with the aim to commit or
attempt to commit a crime, preparatory actions or financial operations
related to the above cited crimes must also be recognized as punishable
actions. Sentences passed by foreign courts for such crimes must be taken
into account when considering recidivism.
The Convention recommends that any extradition treaty should make these
crimes subject to extradition.
Yet while instituting punishment for a long list of drug-related crimes
the Uniform Convention also includes a special decision on treating drug
addicts. It calls on the member-states to create conditions conducive to
providing them with rehabilitation and restoring their ability to work. If
economic opportunities are available in the country, appropriate conditions
should be created providing preventive treatment to drug addicts.
The UN Convention of 1988:
The 1988 Convention regulates questions relating to the illegal
trafficking of drugs and psycho tropes. The aim of this Convention is to
promote cooperation between the contracting parties so as to more
effectively solve various problems involving worldwide illegal drug
trafficking, curtail its size and prevent its grave consequences. The
Convention particularly emphasizes the danger of the proliferation of
illegal drug trafficking and the involvement of children in it. It points
to the need to ensure control of easily accessible substances and those,
which are used to make narcotics illegally.
Special attention is paid to the need to improve international
cooperation to block illegal drug trafficking at sea. The Convention
envisages steps to prevent a certain number of offenses.
The contracting parties are expected to adopt necessary legislative and
organizational steps. The following provisions seem to be the most
interesting.
The Notion of Illegal Drug Trafficking:
Firstly, there is a provision, bearing the form of a recommendation,
for member states that national legislation should recognize certain
premeditated actions included by the Convention into the notion of "illegal
trafficking" as common crimes. Actions that violate the 1961 Convention
(with amendments) include: production, manufacture, preparation, offer for
sale, distribution, sale, delivery on any terms, middleman services,
shipping, transit shipping, transportation, and importation or exportation
of any narcotic. Other actions which should be recognized as crimes are the
cultivation of specially indicated narcotic-bearing plants in order to turn
out drugs; storing or purchasing any narcotic for illegal trafficking;
making, transporting or distributing equipment, materials or substances for
the purpose of illegal cultivation, production or manufacture of narcotics;
organization, guidance or financing of any offenses listed above;
conversion or transfer of property obtained from the above mentioned
offenses in order to conceal or cover up an illegal source of property or
in order to help a person who is taking part in committing the listed
offenses to evade responsibility for his actions; concealment or secrecy of
the true nature of the source, whereabouts, arrangement method, transfer of
the rights in relation to property or its belonging if it is known that
this property is gained as a result of the listed offenses; possession of
equipment or materials needed to illegally cultivate, produce or make any
narcotic; public encouragement or incitement of other persons by any means
to commit any of the above-mentioned offenses; participation or involvement
in a criminal collusion in order to commit the mentioned offenses, as well
as accomplice, incitement, assistance or advice during their commission;
and intentional storage, acquisition or cultivation of any narcotic for
personal use in defiance of the provisions of the 1961 Convention (with
amendments).
Secondly, there is a provision concerning matters of responsibility and
punishment of people convicted of dangerous drug-related crimes. This
provision recommends such sanctions as imprisonment or the deprivation of
freedom, as well as additional measures in the form of rehabilitation,
restoration of the ability to work, or social reintegration with subsequent
supervision.
Controlled Deliveries:
Thirdly, there is a provision about the use of controlled deliveries at
the international level based on mutual accords. Controlled delivery is a
method under which exportation, transportation or importation of illegal or
suspicious batches of drugs are allowed on the territory of one or several
countries with the knowledge and under the supervision of competent
agencies in order to identify the participants in these offenses.
Most norms covered by international conventions are part of the laws of
the Russian Federation, and more of these norms may be registered in the
future provided there are suitable conditions.
Measures to Prevent Drug Money Laundering:
There are two documents, which have been mentioned earlier that are
very important in controlling drug abuse because they affect the "sore
points" of narco-business. Both of these documents need to be applied in
the Russian Federation. One, from 12th December 1988, is a statement by the
Committee on Banking Rules and Banking Supervision. Its aim is to prevent
the criminal use of the banking system for laundering money gained from the
trade in drugs. The other is the decision by the heads of state and
government of the 7 leading industrial countries and by the European
Commission Chairman. Under this decision taken at the 15th Economic Summit
in Paris in July 1989, a Special Operations Group on financial issues was
set up.
It must also be noted that the past few years have seen the convocation
of numerous official and unofficial conferences, symposia and meetings of
experts specializing in combating drug abuse, including one held in 1996 in
Baku. They all worked out and recommended for implementation various
measures to control narcotics.
Par. 2. Tendencies in the World Community's Reaction to Drug Abuse.
The world community counteracts the negative tendencies of drug abuse.
This can be clearly seen in the materials of the world fora and in the
international legal acts.
The Overriding Tendency of Combating Drug Abuse:
The overriding tendency is the expanding scale, and improvement of
activities, as well as of the international legal regulations combating
drug abuse. The core of this tendency is expressed in the following
trajectory from the study of drug abuse, and exerting influence by the
world community through establishing international control over legitimate
distribution and consumption of drugs, to the adoption and implementation
of the increasingly diversified, detailed, rationalized and tough measures
combating illegal drug trafficking and criminal drug money laundering.
These measures are being worked out by international agencies and
organizations and are aimed at fully blocking the spread of narcotics.
This overall tendency can be seen in several of its more concrete
manifestations, such as bringing the problem of narcotics to the forefront;
expanding the sphere of the international legal regulation by amending
existing measures and approving new international legal norms; making
actions against drug abuse more purposeful by revealing its most vulnerable
spots and controlling them by using new, more perfected international legal
norms; ensuring a more universal, unified and standardized understanding of
international legal terms regulating narcotics and; adopting international
legal norms that pave the way for a real opportunity to combat narcotics;
bringing international and national legal acts in line concerning actions
against narcotics in the process of nations joining international legal
acts and ratifying them; increasing the number of countries taking part in
international conferences on actions against narcotics and the number of
countries joining international legal acts and setting up and expanding the
functions of specialized international agencies that work to combat
narcotics.
Bringing to the Foreground Problems of Combating Drug Abuse:
Nearly 80 years since the convocation of the Shanghai Opium Commission
in 1909, the first official body on the international scene that had drawn
attention to the problems of narcotics, its regulation and gradual
restriction, public attention to the problem has been steadily growing in
proportion to the rise in the degree of public danger and the spread of
narcotics. This is manifested by the increasing number of conferences,
meetings, and symposia that concentrate on working out and adopting various
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