Pubdate: Tue, 26 Mar 2002
Source: Reuters (Wire)
Copyright: 2002 Reuters Limited
Author: Mark John

WHIFF OF CANNABIS STIRS FRENCH PRESIDENT RACE

PARIS - The acrid scent of cannabis wafted into France's presidential race 
on Tuesday as Socialist Prime Minister Lionel Jospin stirred controversy by 
suggesting occasional smokers should be treated with leniency.

Supporters of conservative President Jacques Chirac, his neck-and-neck 
rival in the April 21 vote, slammed the remarks as irresponsible while the 
country's pro-legalisation lobby called for a proper debate on reform of 
France's tough drug laws.

Jospin, who has previously owned up to having smoked cannabis himself 
twice, started it all by telling an interviewer on Monday: "Smoking a joint 
at home is certainly less dangerous than drinking and driving."

He added that outright legalisation would send the wrong signal to the 
young but insisted France's 32-year-old drug laws should be applied "in an 
intelligent manner" towards users.

With law and order the dominant issue so far in the election campaign, the 
comments drew swift condemnation on Tuesday from Chirac's Rally for the 
Republic (RPR) party.

"This is typical of the attitude of his government, whose ministers have 
sought time and again to trivialise this issue," said RPR deputy Bernard 
Accoyer, referring to earlier calls on the left to reform drug laws.

"He clearly has no idea of the real damage caused (by cannabis)," Accoyer 
said in a statement.

Some four million French are believed to smoke cannabis, whether in the 
form of hashish resin or marijuana leaves.

Some European countries are increasingly turning a blind eye to small users 
as they refocus police efforts on hard drugs such as heroin or cocaine. In 
France, someone caught in possession of enough cannabis for one joint could 
face jail as a dealer.

Jospin suggested during his victorious 1997 parliamentary election campaign 
that he would look at relaxing French laws on soft drugs, but then 
backpedalled amid protests from the right.

The left-leaning magazine Le Nouvel Observateur said in a website editorial 
posted on Tuesday that legalisation would mean fewer backstreet dealers 
working on high margins and also supplying hard drugs.

"Instead of being run by gangsters, it would be in the hands of a few 
well-regulated professionals," it argued.

Only two of over a dozen candidates in the presidential race back outright 
legalisation -- the Greens' Noel Mamere and Olivier Besancenot, a 
27-year-old Trotskyite postman.

Analysts say French attitudes on soft drugs are linked closely to overall 
political leanings. They talk about the "joint-smoking left" and the 
"red-wine-drinking right."
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