SHINAHOTA, Bolivia-During nearly 14 years as president, Evo Morales pampered the Chapare, the coca leaf-growing jungle region of central Bolivia where he got his start in politics.

Mr. Morales expelled U.S. antidrug agents and promoted the health benefits of the coca leaf, the raw material for cocaine, which is legal and chewed by many indigenous people. His socialist government built a paper mill, an airport, and a 25,000-seat soccer stadium in the region. In turn, the farmers gave Mr. Morales, the head of a federation of coca growers, their fervent support.

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GENEVA - The United Nations' top human rights body voted on Thursday to examine thousands of alleged extrajudicial police killings linked to President Rodrigo Duterte's war on drugs in the Philippines, a campaign that rights groups around the world have denounced as a lawless atrocity.

The United Nations' 47-member Human Rights Council supported a resolution advanced by Iceland that turned a spotlight on wide-ranging abuses, including killings, enforced disappearances, arbitrary arrests, and persecution of rights activists, journalists, lawyers and members of the political opposition.

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President Trump's proposal to invoke the death penalty for drug traffickers is an idea that is, in the practical scheme of things, unworkable. It is also probably unconstitutional and obviously simplistic. It is a gimmick, not a policy.

We need a policy.

The president likes dramatic gestures for difficult problems - a ban on all potential terrorists, a big wall next to Mexico, a 25-percent tariff on steel. This is not an altogether bad instinct. We need strong, decisive leaders and criminals need to fear punishment.

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President Trump made big news in New Hampshire this week with his call for applying the death penalty to big drug dealers - and that only goes to show that bad policy makes for easy headlines.

The best explanation of why that's a thoroughly wrong-headed approach is also the simplest: Western societies don't execute people for those kinds of crimes. Nor should we start.

Without using names, Trump cited conversations with international leaders who supposedly told him their countries have no drug problems because they have the death penalty for drug traffickers. Only a handful of nations routinely execute drug smugglers or traffickers. Among them: China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Vietnam, and Malaysia. That's hardly an honor roll of nations that respect human rights and liberties or the process of law; their leaders are not the people Trump should be consulting on criminal justice policy.

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Scott Reid stood alone on the Conservative benches as the House of Commons gave its final say on landmark legislation to legalize the recreational use of marijuana.

Of the 74 Conservative MPs in attendance for the late November vote, he was the only one to support the bill. He was also the only MP in the Chamber who could say with some level of confidence that his vote represented the wish of his constituents.

Nearly 3,100 of Mr. Reid's constituents in the Eastern Ontario rural riding of Lanark-Frontenac-Kingston responded to a mail-in referendum on the bill, resulting in a narrow finding of 55-per-cent support. Mr. Reid voted accordingly.

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The head of Edmonton's Police Service looks ahead to 2018 with skepticism around supervised consumption sites,

Edmonton Police Service Chief Rod Knecht says police have had a good but "extremely busy" year. Metro asked him about some of the year's biggest stories and what to expect in 2018. The interview has been edited for space.

Metro: Cannabis will be legal July 1. Has EPS backed off marijuana related arrests since legalization was announced?

We're busy. Obviously there's lots of crimes, and we enforce crime on priority.

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The anti-narcotics police arrived here in the heart of Colombia's cocaine industry last month to destroy the coca crop. The community was determined to save it.

Roughly 1,000 farmers, some armed with clubs, surrounded the hilltop camp that police had set up in a jungle clearing and began closing in on the officers.

The police started shooting. When they were done, seven farmers were dead and 21 were wounded.

"Several friends and neighbors died on the ground waiting for medical assistance," said Luis Gaitan, 32, who protected himself by hiding behind a tree stump.

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If St. Paul, one of the most virulent and effective enemies of early Christians could pull off the greatest about face in history and become the religion's most prolific proponent, then who am I to argue with former Toronto police chief Julian Fantino as a shill for the marijuana industry.

Fantino, the macho, no-nonsense, law-and-order tough guy from Vaughan stood at a podium in his city Tuesday singing the virtues of - pot.

Yes, he used to bust men and women, boys and girls - locked them up for smoking a joint or a spliff - ignoring the haze of vibe-inducing smoke and the good vibes of the "natural mystic flowing in the air," riding the Rasta rhythms of Bob Marley or the raw rhetoric of Peter Tosh's Legalize it. That was then.

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One of the Trudeau government's stated policy goals for ending marijuana prohibition is to divert the profits reaped by gangsters toward legitimate shareholders. But an investigation by Greg McArthur and Molly Hayes offers a glimpse into the insidious nature of organized crime, finding that criminal groups easily exploited loopholes in the federal government's old medical-marijuana licensing regimes

In the late afternoon of March 14 in the Toronto suburb of Woodbridge, a masked gunman jumped out of the passenger side of a black Jeep Cherokee, darted across a snow-dusted parking lot and unleashed a flurry of bullets into a black BMW. Thirty seconds later, he was back in the car, leaving Saverio Serrano - the son of a notorious Canadian Mafia figure and cocaine importer - wounded, and Mr. Serrano's 28-year-old girlfriend dead.

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President Trump's declaration of a national opioid crisis creates an opportunity to bring greater focus and more resources to a scourge that is killing an average of almost 150 people a day. (Getty Images)

President Trump's recent declaration recognizing the opioid crisis acknowledges something people have been saying for years. It remains to be seen whether this new development opens up more resources.

The opioid epidemic is ravaging a generation of mostly young people, although older people are not immune. There are an estimated 2.6 million opioid addicts in the United States.

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Here's an idea what to do about all those illegal drugs that are confiscated, and the drug dealers they arrest in the process. Put it all in a cargo plane and send all of it to ISIS. Give the terrorists all the drugs, along with the dealers. This would save a lot of manpower, bullets, and not having to store any of the evidence anywhere, where it could only take up space the authorities don't have. Never mind all the money we, the taxpayer, can all save on not having trials for the criminals. And the jail time they may get. At the same time, we solve our terrorist wars and troubles. Another saving on the taxpayers wallets.

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'Co-ordinated approach' begins on revenue tools

OTTAWA * As the country's finance ministers meet in Ottawa, the Trudeau government should expect to hear concerns about the added burden marijuana legalization could heap onto provincial shoulders.

The agenda for the two-day, federal-provincial-territorial gathering, which started Sunday, will include discussions on how best to apply taxes on a regulated market for cannabis.

The federal government introduced legislation in April with a goal of legalizing and regulating the use of recreational marijuana by July 2018.

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In Heather Mac Donald's "Mandatory Minimums Don't Deserve Your Ire" (op-ed, May 26) about mandatory minimum sentences (MMS), she writes that 10-year mandatory minimum prison sentences are only given to large-scale traffickers. In 2004 I was sentenced to 55 years in federal prison for selling $1,000 worth of marijuana while possessing a firearm. The judge who sentenced me called my punishment "unjust, cruel and even irrational" and compared it to the much shorter federal sentences given to repeat child rapists, murderers and even some terrorists.

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Be careful! This is the message to users of illegal drugs from a community-wide education and awareness campaign that includes a website, www.FentanylCAnKill.ca .

Drug overdoses have killed hundreds of people in British Columbia. The most recent report shows that 120 died in March of this year.

The local campaign is in response to a spate of opioid overdoses.

One day last October, Brantford police and paramedics were called to three separate incidents, involving four people who overdosed on fentanyl. That day was similar to an overnight incident in June when there were four fentanyl overdoses and one death in the city.

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Be careful! This was the message to users of illegal drugs from the North Bay Parry Sound District Health Unit. Drug overdoses have killed hundreds of people in British Columbia. The most recent report shows that 120 died in March of this year.

The local warning came as a result of a man using tainted cocaine. He was taken to the North Bay Regional Health Centre. He was given large doses of naloxone. It probably saved his life. Drug users are being told to have a friend standing by when they ingest drugs. If something goes wrong the friend can dial 911 and perhaps save a life.

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A prison sentence of up to 14 years for providing cannabis to youth is shaping up as one of the early points of contention as the Liberal government prepares to defend its landmark legislation to legalize recreational marijuana.

Bill C-45, the Cannabis Act, makes clear in its opening passages that the main purpose of the legislation is to prevent young people from accessing cannabis.

Those opening statements are backed up with stiff penalties, including imprisonment for up to 14 years for providing marijuana to someone 17 or under.

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People in 29 states can legally use medical marijuana for a variety of problems, including the relief of pain, anxiety or stress. But what if they want to travel with it?

Secure airport areas beyond the Transportation Security Administration checkpoints are under federal control, and the federal government classifies marijuana as a Schedule 1 (most harmful) substance, even in states where it is legal for adults to consume it.

The laws conflict, but federal law trumps state law, making it illegal to fly with marijuana in carry-on or checked luggage. It is also illegal to transport marijuana across state lines, even if both states have legalized it.

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Some columns are hard to write because it's almost impossible to stop watching the events that propel them.

That's the way it was with Monday's emergency legislature debate on opioid addiction and deaths.

It was fascinating, emotional, moving and very informative. It might have surprised many Albertans who think politicians have no clue about real life.

MLAs on all sides - Wildrose, PC, Alberta Party, Liberal and NDP - have seen the carnage close up.

Progressive Conservative MLA Rick Fraser, a former EMS worker, recalled arriving at a residence to find a 14-year-old boy who'd seemed perfectly normal when he arrived home, only to die shortly afterward in the basement.

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HMCS Saskatoon deployed Feb. 20, beginning its latest contribution to Operation Caribbe, Canada's decade-long contribution to the multinational campaign against illicit trafficking by transnational organized crime in the Caribbean sea and the eastern Pacific Ocean.

The Kingston-Class Maritime Coastal Defence Vessel and its crew are fulfilling Canada's commitment to Operation Martillo - the United-States led multinational effort among Western Hemisphere and European nations aimed at drug interdiction and counter smuggling operations in the area.

"By preventing the flow of illicit drugs and denying unlawful access to the sea, our sailors are effectively interrupting a major funding source for organized crime," said Lieutenant-Commander Todd Bacon, Commanding Officer HMCS Saskatoon. "Our mission success during these operations is a result of the continued support our sailors receive from their family, friends and colleagues back home."

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A pot bust against legal growers in Yolo County seems to go too far

If ever you needed proof that we live in an age of confusion about marijuana laws, let me share with you the story of Ted Hicks and Ryan Mears, two Sacramento-area entrepreneurs who decided to start a legal medical cannabis business last year and ended up on the business end of assault rifles wielded by officers from a multi-agency, anti-drug task force.

I first heard about the case from Yolo County Supervisor Don Saylor in September, at a "State of Marijuana" conference aboard the Queen Mary in Long Beach. Saylor, who was on a panel discussing how cities and counties were dealing with cannabis regulation, said that Hicks and Mears and their business, Big Red Farms, were considered by county officials to be "shining stars" in the cannabis licensing arena.

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