Cannabis cafe owners go to court in last-ditch bid to stop pass system

Lawyers representing a number of cannabis cafe owners and workers in Maastricht are going to court in an effort to halt government plans to turn them into members' only clubs.

Maastricht lawyer Andre Beckers told the Telegraaf they consider the plan breaks the law because non-Dutch residents will be banned from entering the cafes and this is discrimination.In addition, the introduction of membership cards infringes upon people's privacy, the lawyers say.It is not clear when the case will be heard.

The government plans to close cannabis cafes in southern parts of the country to non-residents on May 1st. The rest of the Netherlands will follow next year.

Justice minister Ivo Opstelten says he is not concerned about the threat of legal action because the legislation has already been looked at by the European Court of Justice.

The aim of the new law is to stop drugs tourism, but opponents say it will lead to an increase in street dealing.

Spanish Town Wants To Grow Cannabis To Pay Off Debt

RASQUERA, Spain - A small town in northeastern Spain, believes it has found a novel way to pay of its debt: cultivating cannabis.

Tucked in the hills of one of Spain’s most picturesque regions, the Catalonian village of Rasquera has agreed to rent out land to grow marijuana, an enterprise the local authorities say will allow them to pay off their 1.3 million euro debt in two years.

Local authorities are keeping the location of the site top secret while Spain’s attorney general investigates the legality of the project. The Catalan regional government has also asked the village for further information about the plan.

Spanish towns are swamped in debt after a decade-long consruction boom that imploded in 2008. Almost one in four Spanish workers is jobless and many cities are months behind in salaries for street cleaners and other municipal employees.

Spain’s central government is now forcing local authorities to tighten their belts even further as a euro zone debt crisis drags on, forcing greater fiscal austerity onto most countries using the single European currency.

The mayor of Rasquera, with 900 inhabitants, said the project will not only benefit locals, but also eliminate organised crime and the tax evasion associated with the cannabis industry thanks to government supervision.

“We want to put an end to mafias, we want to finish with the black market, we want to put an end to the underground economy,” said Bernat Pellisa, Rasquera’s mayor of nine years said.“The only thing this humble mayor wants and has tried to do is to supervise all this in order to benefit society and the neighbours of our village,” he added.


The Barcelona Personal Use Cannabis Association (ABCDA) will pay Rasquera 54,170 euros a month from July 2012 for a 15 hectare plot of land and local authorities hope the farm will generate 40 jobs in the village.


VILLAGERS WELCOME PLAN


The proposal has sparked debate on the legality of cannabis. Spanish law allows the cultivation of cannabis as long as it is for “personal and shared use.” Trafficking, however, is punished with up to six years in jail.
The mayor said residents of Rasquera have welcomed the initiative, as long as it abides by the law, and that he is responding to the wishes of the people.


“It’s a potential solution for the government to pay our debt. They are working to check out if it’s legal and if they can regularize it. And if it is possible, then perfect,” Rasquera resident Josep Francesc, 22, said.
For a 67-year-old woman who didn’t want to give her name, the project would only be acceptable if the cannabis was used for medical purposes.


“They say it is going to be used by laboratories, to produce medicine. If that is the goal, then welcome. There is almost no medicine that doesn’t use drugs. But if it is used in a different way, then I don’t agree,” she said.
As cannabis must be planted in March, 36,000 euros ($47,200)has already been paid and cultivation could begin shortly.


Marta Suarez, spokeswoman of ABCDA, said the plantation in Rasquera was not a business-orientated project.
“The goal is not to maximize our profits or produce as much as possible, but to produce with quality in a controlled environment to supply users...in a responsible, appropriate and informed manner,” she says.
ABCDA has 5,000 members and is based in Barcelona, the capital of the Catalonia region.
If the cannabis cultivation project goes through, the villagers of Rasquera will have an alternative to traditional jobs in olive groves, vineyards and citrus plantations, and the village debt could finally “go up in smoke.”

Study: Intelligence, cognition unaffected by heavy cannabis use

The new study of cognitive changes caused by heavy marijuana use has found no lasting effects 28 days after quitting. Following a month of abstinence, men and women who smoked pot at least 5,000 times in their lives performed just as well on psychological tests as people who used pot sparingly or not at all, according to a report in the latest edition of the Archives of General Psychiatry.

That's the good news. The bad news, not included in the study, is that most heavy users admit that pot has had a negative effect on their physical and mental health as well their functioning on the job and socially.

"If there's one thing I've learned from studying marijuana for more than a decade, it's that proponents and opponents of the drug will put opposite spins on these findings," says Harrison Pope, a Harvard professor of psychiatry and leader of the research. "One day I'll get a letter that will say, 'we are shocked that you are so irresponsible as to publish a report that claims marijuana is almost harmless. That's a terrible disservice to our children.' The next day, I'll get a letter complaining that I'm 'irresponsible for implying there's something wrong with smoking marijuana. You have set back the legalization (of marijuana) movement by 20 years.'

"As a scientist, I'm struck by how passionately people hold opinions in both directions no matter what the evidence says. The other striking thing is how little we actually know about the effects of a drug that has been smoked for thousands of years and been studied for decades."

Withdrawal produces impairment

That shortage of knowledge motivated Pope and his colleagues at McLean Hospital, a Harvard-affiliated psychiatric facility in Belmont, to investigate the drug's long-term cognitive effects. They recruited 180 people, 63 of them heavy users who currently smoked pot daily, 45 former heavy users, and 72 who had used the drug no more than 50 times in their lives. Heavy use was defined as smoking pot at least 5,000 times. The subjects ranged in age from 30 to 55 years. Most of them were males because studies indicate that women are less likely to become heavy marijuana users.

All took batteries of intelligence, attention, learning and memory tests on days 0, 1, 7, and 28 after quitting the drug. (Daily urine samples confirmed whether or not they had stopped.) On days 0, 1 and 7, current heavy smokers scored significantly lower then the other groups on memory tests.

"By day 28, however, there were no significant differences among the groups on any of 10 different tests, and no significant association between cumulative lifetime marijuana use and test scores," Pope says. In other words, the researchers conclude that heavy marijuana use produces no irreversible mental deficits.

The investigators cannot say for sure why pot smokers remain impaired for days or weeks after giving up the drug. One possibility is that that they retain substantial amounts of a compound known as THC, the active ingredient of marijuana, in their systems. THC dissolves in body fat, then slowly percolates into the blood and brain over days and weeks after a joint is smoked.

Another explanation blames a withdrawal effect, similar but not as pronounced as the agitation, irritability, sleeping problems and appetite loss suffered by users of heroin or alcohol. Such symptoms impair attention and memory.

"Some of the deficits we saw were as bad, or even worse on day seven as on day one," Pope notes. "This suggests that withdrawal, rather than a residue of drug in the brain, accounts for the bulk of lingering impairments." A residue effect should decrease from day one to seven after quitting, but withdrawal problems would increase before they decrease.

Pot smokers who believe they are back to normal sometimes show detectable impairments on various tests. "That's a cause for concern," Pope points out. "You don't want to try landing a 747, driving a bus or train, or taking a calculus test a week after heavy marijuana use even if you feel normal."

Unsatisfied lives

Although researchers found no irreversible cognitive defects from a lifetime of marijuana consumption, pot users are not a happy lot. In a separate study, most heavy users admitted that the drug has a negative impact on all aspects of their lives from job performance and physical health to mental well being and satisfactory socializing.

Heavy smokers also have substantially smaller incomes and lower levels of education than nonusers or light users, despite the fact that the education and income levels of their families are the same. However, there's no way to determine if marijuana is the cause or if these people naturally have less ambition.

"It's a chicken and egg situation," Pope admits. "Probably the direction of causality goes both ways. In all likelihood, people who become frequent users are somewhat different at the outset; they may have lower cognitive abilities or less motivation. Once they start using the drug regularly, these differences become wider."

Asked if his conclusions would lead him to make any recommendations for or against legalizing marijuana, Pope answered "no, because so many other political and social factors are involved." He noted that alcohol, which is sold legally, causes cognitive deficits in long-term heavy users that do not disappear after 28 days and may be cumulative. However, he adds, "such toxicity is only one factor in the decision."

A number of investigations have linked marijuana to an increased risk of lung cancer. A recent Harvard study concluded that a middle-age person's chance of having a heart attack increases nearly five times during the first hour after smoking pot. That's especially meaningful for baby boomers who developed the habit in their teens and 20s and continue to use the drug in their 30s, 40s, and 50s. Other researchers have associated pot with impaired disease resistance and adverse effects on fetuses when mothers smoke the drug during pregnancy.

On the other hand, many claims exist that marijuana eases the nausea produced by cancer drugs and relives the pain of diseases such as AIDS, severe arthritis, and glaucoma. Such claims led Canada recently to legalize its medical use.

Pope raises a caveat: "Is it better than other treatments for the same conditions? Given the association with lung cancer and other ills, does it provide more benefit than risk?"

Pro-pot people argue that, even if it's only equal in efficacy to prescription and over-the-counter drugs, it's much cheaper. "After all, it's only a weed," Pope points out.

All of these factors emphasize Pope's point that not much is really known about marijuana despite its long history of use and decades of study.

By William J. Cromie 
Gazette Staff

Smuggler jailed for his part in £150MILLION conspiracy to bring cannabis into Britain in flower boxes

A smuggler who helped ship cannabis into the UK in flower boxes from Holland has been jailed after an international crime squad cracked the country’s 'biggest ever' conspiracy to import the drug.

Edwin Van Winsen was sentenced to four years in prison for his part in the operation, which used a flower import company as a cover to get an estimated £150m pounds worth of the drug from the Netherlands to the UK.

Between June and October 2008, the Dutch national helped ship over £73m pounds worth of the drug into the country.

When travelling between the UK and the Netherlands the 'flashy' smuggler would travel in an Audi A6, and was surrounded by women as he drank champagne on the ferry. Winsen, 33, is the final man from the syndicate to be jailed after trials for other ‘executives’ from the sophisticated scheme were held last year.

The international investigation spanned Western and Eastern Europe, from the UK, Ireland, Holland, France, Germany, Italy and the Ukraine and saw the Force working closely with West Mercia Police, the Dutch and German authorities and the Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA).

Prosecutor Andrew Kershaw today told Leeds Crown Court: 'Mr Van Winsen was concerned with organising and taking 52 deliveries.'It is estimated he was involved in the total import of around 8,580kg of the drug which has an estimated street value of £73.5m pounds. 'The drugs were hidden in flower boxes and were delivered to auction houses across West Yorkshire where they were transported to various storage premises.'They were then picked up by drivers from across the country in rented vans often within minutes of being dropped off.'

The court heard Van Winsen was given an Audi A6 to drive while he worked on the scheme and was also said to be extravagant with his cash.Ringleader Johannes Elmendorp, 51, was sentenced to 18 years imprisonment in August last year.The Dutch national was the sole director of Fresh Flower Concept Ltd, a UK registered company which distributed the consignments to Leeds, Bradford and Birmingham.

He, along with Van Winsen, organised the delivery of the airtight bags of cannabis hidden in boxes of fresh flowers which bona fide transport companies delivered to addresses in the UK from four addresses in West Yorkshire.

Operations were then switched to the West Midlands when Dutch police seized three loads intended for the UK.

During investigations conducted by West Yorkshire Police, West Mercia Police and the Dutch authorities, it was established that a total of 102 deliveries were made to the UK with an estimated total weight of 16.8 tonnes, which police estimate equates to almost £150m pounds in street value

West Yorkshire Police had begun surveillance at Oak Mill in Morley, Leeds, after being alerted about suspicious activities in October 2008 after Van Winsen had organised to have the drugs delivered there. 

Mitigating for Van Winsen, Damien Nolan said: 'He was asked to be involved in this scheme on no less than three occasions but he refused. 'He had been having financial problems with a company of which he was the director and it was this which made him take up the offer to become involved by one of the ringleaders.'He was eventually caught by police but had already left the operation as he knew it was the wrong thing to be involved with.'

Judge Sally Cahill sentenced Van Winsen, of Sassenheim, Netherlands, to four years minus the 340 days he has already spent on remand. Terence Koetsier, 22, of Rotterdam, Netherlands, who was arrested in Gran Canaria in January last year, was jailed for two years after a jury found him guilty of conspiracy to import and supply cannabis last August.

Cannabis Can Help Prevent Suicide, Study Suggests

A new study from Germany says that, in U.S. states like California where marijuana has become medically legit, rates of suicide have gone down.

The researchers note that suicide is often triggered by "stressful life events." And you know what can take away the pain?

No. Not Enrique Iglesias. Stress! Or rather, chronic. Depending.

The academics note that "California includes anxiety as a qualifying condition" to obtain medical pot, "while Delaware and New Mexico both allow the use of medical marijuana for post traumatic stress disorder ... "

The Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA) in Bonn, with the help of American researchers such as Daniel I. Rees of the University of Colorado's Department of Economics, recently published their findings in a paper called High on Life? Medical Marijuana Laws and Suicide (PDF):

Our results suggest that the passage of a medical marijuana law is associated with an almost 5 percent reduction in the total suicide rate, an 11 percent reduction in the suicide rate of 20- through 29-year-old males, and a 9 percent reduction in the suicide rate of 30- through 39-year-old males.

The study takes some wild guesses, and one of them is that maybe medical marijuana users are cutting out the alcohol, which can be depressive:

The strong association between alcohol consumption and suicide related outcomes found by previous researchers (Markowitz et al. 2003; Carpenter 2004; Sullivan et al. 2004; Rodriguez Andres 2005; Carpenter and Dobkin 2009) raises the possibility that medical marijuana laws reduce the risk of suicide by decreasing alcohol consumption.

The academics cite research on animals where there was "a potent anti-depressant effect" when they were injected with low doses of synthetic cannabinoid.

Of course this flies in the face of tons of research -- not to mention what Dr. Drew Pinsky has said several times -- that cannabis and depression go together like milk and cookies.

And, it seems clear to us, the only solid argument to be made here is there might be a correlation between medical marijuana states and lower rates of suicides.

Hmm. National suicide rates have been decreasing across the board.

Researchers say they focused mostly on young men because most medical marijuana patients in states like Arizona, Colorado and Montana are males, and roughly half are under 40. Data on women, apparently, was weak. (Women are four times less likely to commit successful suicide in general).

The German study's rosy conclusion:

... The legalization of medical marijuana leads to an improvement in the psychological well being of young adult males, an improvement that is reflected in fewer suicides.

Believe that. Or not.

UK: David Cameron knows the drug laws aren't working; his failure to change them is simple cowardice

Let's play a game of make-believe. Pretend you're a Home Office minister. One of your European neighbours employs a radical public health policy and, 10 years later, has seen huge improvements in the measurements of all the relevant health outcomes. The evidence for the efficacy of that health policy is widespread; the British Medical Journal and World Health Organisation have both issued major pieces of research, along with one of the leading journals in the field, which say that in general the policy has positive effects. Further, the proposed policy is significantly cheaper than the existing one, and has the added bonus of giving more responsibility and freedom to individual citizens. What do you do?

Well, obviously, if the policy is the decriminalisation of drug use, then you reject it out of hand.

The AFP reported, back in last July, that Portugal has reported a 50 per cent drop in "problem" drug users in the decade since they decriminalised all drugs. Dr Joao Goulao, the president of the country's Institute of Drugs and Drug Addiction, says that "There is no doubt that the phenomenon of addiction is in decline in Portugal," although he is quick to point out that other factors, including "treatment and risk reduction policies", have played their part as well as legalisation. Of course, as the AFP story notes, those treatment and risk policies are part of Portugal's health-based approach to drug use, and taken together the policies have led to a "spectacular" drop in infections like HIV and hepatitis among intravenous drug users, and a significant drop in crime. And a report by the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction praised the Portuguese approach, saying it, unlike other drug policies, is or at least attempts to be "internally consistent…  pragmatic and innovative… transparent, coherent and well-structured", and saying that its success in reducing use is a blow to the theory that "decriminalisation, or a less punitive approach, leads to increased use" of drugs.

I write a close variant of this piece about once every three months. Some new piece of research is published suggesting that drug prohibition laws do more harm than good, or some high-profile former politician or policeman or lawyer comes out saying that police resources are being wasted on an unwinnable war, or yet another triumphant statistic gets trumpeted out of Portugal. I've written about a major BMJ piece, backed by the Transform Drugs Policy Foundation, which says "prohibition on production, supply, and use of certain drugs has not only failed to deliver its intended goals but has been counterproductive"; a WHO reportsaying "countries with stringent user-level illegal drug policies did not have lower levels of use than countries with liberal ones", and a systematic review in the International Journal of Drug Policy last yearwhich found that "increasing drug law enforcement is unlikely to reduce drug market violence. Instead, the existing evidence base suggests that gun violence and high homicide rates may be an inevitable consequence of drug prohibition and that disrupting drug markets can paradoxically increase violence."

But every time, the Home Office deadbats with bland statement on the lines of: drugs are bad, mmmkay. This time it's: "We have no intention of liberalising our drugs laws. Drugs are illegal because they are harmful – they destroy lives and cause untold misery to families and communities. Those caught in the cycle of dependency must be supported to live drug free lives, but giving people a green light to possess drugs through decriminalisation is clearly not the answer. Through the cross-government drug strategy, we are taking action through tough enforcement, both at home and abroad, alongside introducing a temporary control power and robust treatment programmes that lead people into drug free recovery.”

If you managed to read all the way through that, you'll notice it says nothing whatsoever about the evidence, despite my specifically asking for a response to the BMJ, WHO and IJDP studies and the Portugal experience. The Home Office, and the Government, is deliberately ignoring the reality of the drug laws' failure.

No one claims that decriminalisation, or rather a cleverly instituted, multi-layer regulation of drug policy as suggested by Transform, will be a magic bullet. But the evidence, at least all the evidence I'm aware of, suggests that it will improve matters, or at the very least not make them worse, if carried out intelligently. What's more, David Cameron knows this, or at least he knew this in 2005, when as a contender for the Conservative Party leadership he called for "alternative ways – including the possibility of legalisation and regulation – to tackle the global drugs dilemma". He said: "Politicians attempt to appeal to the lowest common denominator by posturing with tough policies and calling for crackdown after crackdown. Drugs policy has been failing for decades." Nick Clegg in 2002 also called for "decriminalising the use of certain substances"and "partially decriminalising the sale of cannabis", and "legalis[ing] the use of drugs for purposes other than medical or scientific ones", ie recreational use.

But, as we've seen, once politicians get in power they get scared. Like their predecessors, this Government is a bunch of political cowards.

LONDON: Cambridge students selling drugs to pay university fee

LONDON: Every seventh Cambridge student is dealing in drugs to pay his or her way through university while nearly two-thirds of the students have admitted taking the banned substance, a survey has revealed.

The survey also found many students claiming to have been forced to sell illegal substances to friends to make ends meet as they study, the Daily Mail reported.

The survey, conducted by student newspaper Varsity, involved 434 students, mostly undergraduates.

Nearly two-thirds admitted taking drugs, with cannabis being the most popular substance, in the survey that found cocaine being the most frequently used Class-A drug, with a quarter of students saying that they had snorted it at some point.

Many claimed that the drug, which has halved in price over the last decade, was more widely used at Cambridge than at any other university they had visited.

At least 14 percent of those, who took banned substances, have as a result been admitted to hospital or needed medical attention at some point.

A King's College student said: "It's hard to juggle a job and studying at Cambridge, so [dealing] is a quick and easy way for them to make cash to pay for the fees."

A fifth said they began to rely on drugs as it helped them manage stress from heavy workloads.

A third of Cambridge students also admitted that one or more of their friends had "serious drug problems", while nearly two in five said they also used prescription drugs for recreational purposes.

A spokesman for the university said: "There is no indication of the validity of this survey but clearly the university doesn't condone dealing in illegal substances."

In 2011-12, the tuition fee for British or European Union students studying for their first undergraduate degree is 3,375 pounds ($5,312) per year for all courses at the university.

However, as per the new structure, the tuition fees for overseas students commencing 2012-13 will range between 13,011 and 31,494 pounds.

Source: http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/

Norway sets limits for drug driving

Norway has become the first country to define legal limits for driving under the influence of drugs other than alcohol, government official say.

Limits for 20 illegal drugs and for medicines with an abuse potential have been introduced by the government, a release from the Norwegian Institute of Public Health said Monday.

While a legal limit for alcohol has been in effect since 1936, there have been no similar limits for illegal drugs and for medicines such as sedatives and painkillers with an abuse potential.

Impairment levels have been set for benzodiazepines, stimulants like amphetamine and cocaine, cannabis, hallucinogens and opiates.

The limits not apply to therapeutic use of medicines with an abuse potential prescribed by a doctor, officials said.

Currently, reliable rapid tests that can be used roadside to indicate the influence of drugs other than alcohol are not available, and police will still have to evaluate impairment by means of field sobriety tests, they said.

In cases where police suspect driving under the influence of drugs, a blood sample will be sent for analysis by the Norwegian Institute of Public Health using the new legislated limits.

Study: Medical Marijuana Laws Result in Fewer Suicides

The enactment of statewide laws allowing for the limited use of cannabis therapeutically is associated with reduced instances of suicide, according to a discussion paper published recently by the Institute for the Study of Labor in Bonn, Germany.

Researchers at Montana State University, the University of Colorado, and San Diego State University assessed rates of suicide in the years before and after the passage of statewide medical marijuana laws.

Authors found, “The total suicide rate falls smoothly during the pre-legalization period in both MML (medical marijuana law) and non-MML states. However, beginning in year zero, the trends diverge: the suicide rate in MML states continues to fall, while the suicide rate in states that never legalized medical marijuana begins to climb gradually.”

They reported that this downward trend in suicides in states post-legalization was especially pronounced in males. “Our results suggest that the passage of a medical marijuana law is associated with an almost 5 percent reduction in the total suicide rate, an 11 percent reduction in the suicide rate of 20- through 29-year-old males, and a 9 percent reduction in the suicide rate of 30- through 39-year-old males,” they determined.

Authors theorized that the limited legalization of cannabis may “lead to an improvement in the psychological well-being of young adult males, an improvement that is reflected in fewer suicides.” They further speculated, “The strong association between alcohol consumption and suicide-related outcomes found by previous researchers raises the possibility that medical marijuana laws reduce the risk of suicide by decreasing alcohol consumption.”

They concluded: “Policymakers weighing the pros and cons of legalization should consider the possibility that medical marijuana laws may lead to fewer suicides among young adult males.”

Full text of the discussion paper, “High on Life: Medical Marijuana Laws and Suicide,” is available onlinehere.

Submitted by NORML on Feb 21, 2012

Almirall files cannabis-based MS drug Sativex in additional EU markets

Spanish pharma company Almirall has started a second wave of regulatory filings in Europe for Sativex, a drug for the treatment of spasticity in patients with multiple sclerosis (MS) originally developed by GW Pharmaceuticals.

Almirall has already launched Sativex (delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol and cannabidiol) in its first markets - Spain, Germany and Denmark - in 2011, and is awaiting approval in Austria, Sweden, Italy and Czech Republic.

The latest round of filings have taken place in in Belgium, Finland, Iceland, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal and Slovakia.

Sativex is an oromucosal spray containing active ingredients from the cannabis sativa plant which is used to provide an additional line of therapy for MS patients who have already failed other treatments for spasticity symptoms.

It is manufactured by GW Pharma under Home Office licence at an undisclosed location in the UK, and represents the first new therapeutic class to treat spasticity in over 10 years. Around 700,000 people in Europe have MS - 80 per cent of whom exhibit spasticity symptoms.

Less than a third of MS patients with spasticity currently receive treatment for the symptom, according to Almirall.

The drug is already sold by Bayer in the UK, which is acting as the reference member state for EU-wide approval, as well as Canada.

Meanwhile, Novartis has launched the drug in New Zealand and also has rights in Australia, Asia (excluding Japan, China and Hong Kong), the Middle East (excluding Israel/Palestine) and Africa.

Otsuka licenses the product in the US and is scheduled to see approval there in 2013.

For Almirall, Sativex is one of six new products coming through development that are lending renewed growth to the business, and the company expects it to be in its top 15 products in 2012.

Sativex and its recently-launched peers - Tesavel (sitagliptin) and Efficib (sitagliptin and metformin) for diabetes, Actikerall (5-FU and salicylic acid) for actinic keratosis, Silodyx (silodosin) for benign prostatic hyperplasia and dermatological treatment Toctino (alitretinoin) - contributed €34m to Almirall's €591m total sales in the first nine months of 2011.

Sativex is also in phase III testing for cancer, with results expected in 2013. Analysts have predicted that the additional indication could drive global sales towards the $400m-$500m range at peak.

Cannabis Cafes Refuse To Implement Dutch-Only “Weed Pass” Program

All 16 cannabis coffee shops in the city of Haarlem have united in opposition to the Dutch government’s “Weed Pass” program, which would bar foreigners from entry to the coffee shops and make the coffee shops “members only” for Dutch citizens. The plan foresees placing a cap on the number of members each coffee shop could have.

The conservative coalition governing the Netherlands doesn’t like marijuana. It has created the Weed Pass program first as a measure to reduce “drug tourism” in Dutch border cities, and second as a means of restricting coffee shop numbers within the county. It was supposed to be rolled out in the border towns in January, but has been delayed until May, and is supposed to go nationwide next year, despite objections from, among others, the city of Amsterdam.

The Haarlem coffee shop owners, unified as Team Haarlems’ Coffeeshopentrepreneurs (THC), announced Friday that they “have decided not to comply with the new criteria for tolerated coffee shops, like registering Dutch citizens as cannabis users, and discriminating against all non-Dutch coffee shop visitors.”

The Weed Pass plan would bankrupt their businesses and lead to increases in street drug dealing and personal marijuana cultivation, the association warned. It cited the results of a poll of 700 coffee shop patrons it had conducted.

That poll found that only 12.4% of participants would register under the Weed Pass program. Nearly 63% said they would buy marijuana on the black market, while 21.7% said they would grow their own instead.

If coffee shops lost nearly 90% of their clientele, they would go broke, so complying with the Weed Pass “is simply no option,” the association said. Closing up shop would result in the loss of about 90 “budtender” jobs in the city, they added.

“We cannot beat bankruptcy, so our staff, customers and ourselves are ready to start a struggle with Justice Minister Ivo Opstelten, before our civilized city will be divided in working areas for street dealers and drug runners,” the association vowed.

Haarlem is a city of about 150,000 people just west of Amsterdam and on the northern fringe of the Randstad, a conurbation of 7.1 million people, that includes Amsterdam, The Hague,  Rotterdam, and Utrecht, and is one of the largest metropolitan areas in Europe.

Article From StoptheDrugWar.org – Creative Commons Licensing

Albanians stop 253 kilograms of cannabis en route to Greece

Albanian border police arrested seven people and seized 253 kilograms of cannabis as they tried to smuggle it into Greece on horses, police said Sunday.

The smugglers were caught by border guard as they were trying to pass southern Albanian frontier with Greece over the mountains, police said.

Police were searching for an eighth suspect thought to be the leader of the group.

On Wednesday, the coast guard in western Greece seized nearly a tonne of cannabis after pursuing a speedboat from Albania to the Greek coast.

Greece is a major market for drugs and illicit weapons smuggled from neighbouring Albania. According to international police reports, Albania is the main supplier of marijuana to Europe.

Read more: http://www.windsorstar.com/news/Albanians+stop+route+Greece/6178914/story.html#ixzz1mvbz7fF2

Ireland: Cannabis-based medicines may be legalised

The Irish Department of Health is planning to make cannabis-containing products available to people suffering from certain serious medical conditions.

Minister of State at the Department of Health Kathleen Lynch, in a Dail reply, said her Department was examining the issues associated with allowing cannabis-containing products to be used under controlled circumstances for patients with specific conditions, in the same way as otherwise illegal drugs such as morphine and methadone are currently used.

As the law currently stands, it is not possible for cannabis-based medicinal products, such as the drug Sativex, to be prescribed by doctors in Ireland.

The Minister said she was aware that claims had been made about possible health benefits of cannabis-based products for patients suffering from certain conditions such as multiple sclerosis (MS).

Sativex is already authorised in the UK for the relief of spasm in patients with MS.

Available as an oral spray, Sativex is the world’s first prescription medicine derived from the cannabis plant. It is used for the treatment of conditions such as spasticity in MS, cancer pain, and neuropathic pain of various origins

Minister Lynch was replying to a PQ from Independent Deputy Luke 'Ming' Flanagan.

[Posted: Sun 19/02/2012 www.irishhealth.com]

Polish Activists Smoke Cannabis In Front Of Parliament In A Bid To End Prohibition

A prominent politician and several other activists have smoked marijuana in front of the Polish Parliament as part of their campaign to legalize cannabis in the Eastern European country.

With police looking on, Janusz Palikot, the head of the left-wing Palikot’s Movement, took a few tokes from a joint under falling snow on Friday to make his point, reports the Associated Press.

Dozens more gathered around a platform where they smoked cannabis and chanted “Grow It, Smoke It, Legalize It.”

At the center of the rally was a banner showing a green marijuana leaf and the word “Legalize.” The smell of burning cannabis was heavy in the chilly air during the demonstration, which took place across the street from the Sejm, the lower house of Parliament.

Palikot had last month promised to smoke marijuana inside the Parliament building, but backed down after threats of arrest and merely lit some cannabis-scented incense.

Palikot was later threatened with a year in jail for even talking about smoking a joint inside Parliament.

Activists at the protest said they want to change Poland’s laws to legalize the possession and consumption of cannabis.

Poland loosened its laws last year to allow small amounts of cannabis for “personal use,” but the protesters said this is too imprecise and is insufficient.

Marijuana use was largely tolerated during the Communist era in Poland, but it wasn’t openly talked about in public. With Solidarity’s victory over the Communist Party, the Catholic church started controlling public policy and the country criminalized drug use and instituted restrictive abortion laws.

The act is part of a “coming out of smokers of weed,” said Stelios Alewras, a 26-year-old who took part in the rally.

“I am a lawyer and we want to show that smoking pot is a normal thing like drinking beer,” Alewras said.

“Vodka is more dangerous than marijuana,” said Mateusz Klinowski, a law professor and head of the Polish Drug Policy Network, which lobbies to decriminalize soft drug use.

Klinowski called Poland’s current drug laws “outdated and wrongheaded.”

By Steve Elliott of Toke of the Town