Topic: Escalating Violence in the International Drug Trade
Country: Jordan
Delegate Name: Rodger MacArthur
School: Roeper School
Topic page: background guide and all position papers All Jordan position papers GLIMUN 2010 committees
Jordan sits at the crossroads of the drug trade in the Middle East; this is a huge risk to national security. Not only does money laundering occur but violence erupts all throughout the country posing a severe risk to citizens. Jordan serves as a transit route for all illicit substances coming from Turkey and Afghanistan.
As a member of the Arab league of states the drug trades not only compromises Jordan’s national security, but the national security of all the other countries in the Middle East. A major threat is trafficking of heroin. In the past 5 years heroin usage has increased 9.3% with alarmingly high increase in the number of women using heroin. The country of Jordan only has a handful of treatment centers each with an average of 20 beds. As bad as this is all the treatment centers are men only, which forces women to seek private treatment which most cannot afford.
Jordan is attempting to fix the drug problem. The control structure in Jordan involves four entities: 1) The Anti-Narcotics Department (AND), which is responsible for the coordinating all of Jordan's enforcement efforts against drug trafficking. 2) The Desert and Border police who patrol the areas between Syria and Saudi Arabia and the desert areas. 3) The General Customs Department which is responsible for general customs and anti-smuggling patrol work. 4) The Jordanian Military, which controls borders.
Jordan needs more financial assistance and support from fellow countries of the Arab League of Nations as well as the UN. In 2005 the UN gave 4.5 million dollars to combat the drug problem in Jordan while this is a start, Jordan needs more funding to fully combat the problem.
