The long war on drugs is taking its toll elsewhere, it seems, with some countries pushing for a less hardline approach.

What the new approach, euphemistically named "harm reduction", embodies in reality is that the war is already half lost. It assumes that since a world free of drugs is plausibly impossible, policies should be tailored to minimise the harm associated with their use. The approach includes the provision of clean needles for drug abusers and supervised injection sites.

An associated development is the relaxation of sanctions on certain drugs.

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Review Needed Only If There Is Evidence That a Different Model Will Work Better, He Says at UN

Singapore will not soften its drug policies, Minister for Home Affairs and Law K. Shanmugam has said at a United Nations meeting, pushing back against calls for a shift in approach to the global war on drugs.

Mr Shanmugam did not mince words in his speech at the UN General Assembly in New York on Wednesday, as he issued a strong rebuttal to countries pushing for a less hardline approach.

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Singapore has blasted widespread calls to make the worldwide fight against illicit drugs less punitive, using a major meeting at the UN to argue that a "soft approach" would cause a flood of narcotics to the island state.

"We believe that drugs will destroy our society," said Singapore Home Affairs Minister Kasiviswanathan Shanmugam.

"With 200 million people travelling through our borders every year, and given Singaporeans' purchasing power, a soft approach will mean our country will be washed over with drugs."

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Singapore's uncompromising stance against drugs is the reason it has stayed relatively drug-free, with arrested drug abusers comprising less than 0.1 per cent of the country's population.

Senior Minister of State for Home Affairs Desmond Lee said this on Monday at a meeting of international delegates, at the United Nations Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND) in Vienna, Austria.

The event is a preparatory meeting for the upcoming UN General Assembly Special Session on the world's drug problem next month, when members will set goals for global drug control in the next decade.

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Some countries are legalising the use of certain pernicious drugs, like cannabis, but Singapore cannot afford to contemplate that prospect. Not after having struggled with drug abuse since its founding. Indeed, it was a distribution centre for opium during colonial times.

By the time its British rulers awoke to the need for anti-drug laws, addiction had worked its way through society, leading to various forms of experimentation, even among schoolchildren. That prompted the setting up of the Central Narcotics Bureau (CNB) in 1971. Over four decades later, the agency is still waging war against the scourge.

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