Topic: Escalating Violence in the International Drug Trade
Country: United States
Delegate Name: Celia Kaechele
School: Forest Hills Central High School
Topic page: background guide and all position papers All United States position papers GLIMUN 2010 committees
The International Drug Trade is hardly a new blight on the face of the world, it has been in existence for decades, and as long as it has been in existence there have been conventions, programs, commissions and missions all working to bring it down once and for all. But perhaps we are missing the root of the problem. As stated by the International Narcotics Control Board (INCB), there is a direct link between corruption and the illicit drug trade and, according to the President of the Board, Professor Hamid Ghodse: “Corruption undermines global efforts in the fight against the illicit drug problem.” This is not to say that the conventions, and etc. (for example, the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, 1961, the Convention on Psychotropic Substances, 1971, and the Convention against the Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances, 1988) are not helping, because that is absolutely not true. Everything currently in place to combat the International Drug Trade should remain in place, governments worldwide, however, are going to have to find new ways to combat this resilient evil. All nations are going to have to work in accordance with the INCB as well as the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and the International Drug Enforcement Conference (IDEC) in accordance with the three previous drug conventions to tighten down once and for all on the high power trafficking groups that have, so far, been able to escape the law.
No nation is safe from illegally trafficked drugs, making this one of the most internationally prevalent topics. No nation can say that they are free from illicit trafficking and the use of illegal drugs, and until we can, we must labor to achieve that goal. Foreign cooperative investigations will have to take place as trafficking rarely takes place solely within the borders of a single country, but between multiple countries. The tightening of boarder security is an issue that should be brought up in this convention, as well as the addressing of particular trafficking “hot spots,” for instance, the cartels that have flared up in Mexico.
The United States highly recommends that, though a great number of nations are members of the IDEC, that the rest of the nations work toward becoming observers at the very least. The IDEC deals with practical strategies to combat the illicit drug trade, skills that could very well come in handy to a number of countries without the means or the knowledge to develop these ideas on their own. This Conference also allows for the discussion and determination of areas harboring the greatest amount of unrest in this topic. It is the fervent hope of the United States that, though these groups have proved elusive, we will be able to apprehend them in the end.
