The former leaders of eight countries have joined ex-U. N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, former U.S. Secretary of State George Shultz, businessman Richard Branson and others in urging governments to ditch drug possession penalties and move toward outright legalization.

The leaders made the recommendations in a report issued Monday by the Global Commission on Drug Policy, a group headed by former Brazilian President Fernando Henrique Cardoso. Shultz, the U.S.’ top diplomat from 1982 to 1989, is the group's honorary chairman.

“Stop criminalizing people for drug use and possession – and stop imposing ‘compulsory treatment’ on people whose only offense is drug use or possession,” the group recommends. “Criminalization of drug use and possession has little to no impact on levels of drug use in an open society.”

Casting off criminal penalties for drug possession and use can be done without modifying international treaties, the report says.

In addition to endorsing decriminalization over the once-progressive concept of drug courts and mandatory treatment, the leaders suggest legal marketplaces for some currently illegal drugs, with marijuana at the top of the list.

“Ultimately the most effective way to reduce the extensive harms of the global drug prohibition regime and advance the goals of public health and safety is to get drugs under control through responsible legal regulation,” the leaders say.

“Allow and encourage diverse experiments in legally regulating markets in currently illicit drugs, beginning with but not limited to cannabis, coca leaf and certain novel psychoactive substances,” they recommend. “Much can be learned from successes and failures in regulating alcohol, tobacco, pharmaceutical drugs and other products and activities that pose health and other risks to individuals and societies.”

Several members of the group have previously called for repealing anti-drug policies. The Global Commission emerged from the Latin American Commission on Drugs and Democracy, which in 2009 called for rethinking the so-called war on drugs and included Cardoso, former Colombian President Cesar Gaviria and former Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo. All three signed off on the new document.

The Global Commission in 2011 cautioned against reflexive opposition to drug legalization and described status quo prohibition as a failure, but took more forceful positions in Monday’s report.

Former Polish President Aleksander Kwasniewski, former Chilean President Ricardo Lagos, former Portuguese President Jorge Sampaio, former Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou and former Swiss President Ruth Dreifuss are commission members, as are former U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour and former U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker.

“If use does increase with moves toward regulation – and the possibility cannot be discounted – it is worth recalling that the totality of associated social and health problems is still likely to decrease,” the new report says. “The use of legally produced products in regulated environments will be intrinsically safer, the harm linked to both the illegal trade and punitive enforcement will be reduced, and obstacles to more effective health and social interventions removed.”

Editorial Cartoons on Marijuana View All 15 Images

The leaders urge governments to focus on violent drug gangs and avoid jailing lower-level cogs in the drug supply chain, such as farmers and couriers.

Activists campaigning for more lenient drug laws praised the report.

"The import of the commission’s report lies in both the distinction of its members and the boldness of their recommendations," says Ethan Nadelmann, executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance. "There’s no question now that the genie of reform has escaped the prohibitionist bottle. I’m grateful to the commission for the pivotal role it has played in taking drug policy reform from the fringes of international politics to the mainstream."



Marijuana for nonmedical use is legal and available at regulated shops in two U.S. states, Colorado and Washington, and soon will be sold in Uruguay, the government of which was chided by an independent U.N. agency in December for allegedly violating a 1961 treaty by approving legalization.