Pubdate: Sun, 16 Feb 2014
Source: Denver Post (CO)
Copyright: 2014 Associated Press
Contact:  http://www.denverpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/122
Author: Gene Johnson, The Associated Press
Page: 15A

Global View of Marijuana Legalization

CHANGES IN U.S. STIRRING THE POT

(AP) - In a former colonial mansion in Jamaica, politicians huddle to 
discuss trying to ease marijuana laws in the land of the late reggae 
musician and cannabis evangelist Bob Marley. In Morocco, one of the 
world's top producers of the concentrated pot known as hashish, two 
leading political parties want to legalize its cultivation, at least 
for medical and industrial use. And in Mexico City, the vast 
metropolis of a country ravaged by horrific cartel bloodshed, 
lawmakers have proposed a plan to let stores sell the drug.

 From the Americas to Europe to North Africa and beyond, the 
marijuana-legalization movement is gaining unprecedented traction- a 
nod to successful efforts in Colorado, Washington state and the small 
South American nation of Uruguay, which in December became the first 
country to approve nationwide pot legalization.

Leaders long weary of the drug war's violence and futility have been 
emboldened by changes in U.S. policy, even in the face of opposition 
from their own conservative populations. Some are eager to try an 
approach that focuses on public health instead of prohibition, and 
some see a potentially lucrative industry in cannabis regulation.

"A number of countries are saying,'We've been curious about this, but 
we didn't think we could go this route,' " said Sam Kamin, a 
University of Denver law professor who helped write Colorado's 
marijuana regulations. "It's harder for the U.S. to look at other 
countries and say, 'You can't legalize, you can't decriminalize,' 
because it's going on here."

That's due largely to a White House that's more open to drug-war alternatives.

President Barack Obama recently told The New Yorker magazine that he 
doesn't think marijuana is anymore dangerous than alcohol, and said 
it's important that the legalization experiments in Colorado and 
Washington go forward, especially because blacks are arrested for the 
drug at a greater rate than whites, despite similar levels of use.

His administration has criticized drug war-driven incarceration rates 
in the U.S. and announced that it will let banks do business with 
licensed marijuana operations, which have largely been cash-only 
because federal law forbids financial institutions from processing 
pot-related transactions.

Such actions underscore how the official U.S. position has changed in 
recent years. In 2009, the U.S. Department of Justice announced it 
wouldn't target medical marijuana patients. In August, the agency 
said it wouldn't interfere with the laws in Colorado and Washington, 
which regulate the growth and sale of taxed pot for recreational use.

Government officials and activists worldwide have taken note of the 
more open stance. Also not lost on them was the Obama 
administration's public silence before votes in both states and in Uruguay.

It creates a "sense that the U.S. is no longer quite the drug 
war-obsessed government it was" and that other nations have some 
political space to explore reform, said Ethan Nadelmann, head of the 
nonprofit Drug Policy Alliance, a pro-legalization group based in New York.

Anxiety over U.S. reprisals has previously doused reform efforts in 
Jamaica, including a 2001 attempt to approve private use of marijuana 
by adults.

Given America's evolution, "the discussion has changed," said Delano 
Seiveright, director of Ganja Law Reform Coalition-Jamaica.

Last summer, eight lawmakers, evenly split between the ruling 
People's National Party and the opposition Jamaica Labor Party, met 
with Nadelmann and local cannabis crusaders at a luxury hotel in 
Kingston's financial district and discussed the next steps, including 
an effort to decriminalize pot possession.

Officials are concerned about the roughly 300 young men each week who 
get criminal records for possessing small amounts of "ganja." Others 
in the debt-shackled nation worry about losing out on tourism 
dollars: For many, weed is synonymous with Marley's home country, 
where it has long been used as a medicinal herb by families, 
including as a cold remedy, and as a spiritual sacrament by Rastafarians.

Influential politicians are taking up the idea of loosening pot 
restrictions. Jamaica's health minister has said he is "fully on 
board" with medical marijuana.

"The cooperation on this issue far outweighs what I've seen before," 
Seiveright said. "Both sides are in agreement with the need to move forward."

In Morocco, lawmakers have been inspired by the experiments in 
Colorado, Washington and Uruguay to push forward their long standing 
desire to allow cannabis to be grown for medical and industrial uses. 
They say such a law would help small farmers who survive on the crop 
but live at the mercy of drug lords and police attempts to eradicate it.

There's no general push to legalize marijuana in Mexico, where tens 
of thousands have died in cartel violence in recent years. But in 
liberal Mexico City, legislators on Thursday introduced a measure to 
let stores sell up to 5 grams of pot. It's supported by the mayor but 
could set up a fight with the conservative federal government.

"Rather than continue fighting a war that makes no sense, now we are 
joining a cutting-edge process," said Jorge Castaneda, a former 
Mexican foreign minister.
- ---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom