Amsterdam falls out of love with coffee shops

EU pushes for common standards on drug treatment
17.02.2005 - 17:42 CET | By Lucia Kubosova

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The new European Commission's plan on illegal drugs suggests setting up minimum EU standards on drug treatment and calls for more effective alternatives to prison for drug related crimes.

However, Brussels, which unveiled its new Drug Action Plan for 2005-2008 on Thursday (17 February) wants to avoid an "ideological debate" on drugs with member states.

Drug abuse is currently at historic levels across Europe, with up to two million problem drug users - especially among young people - in the EU.

The European Commission argues that there is a need for "solid and intelligent co-operation at the European level", pointing to a 2002 survey which suggested that 71% of Europeans wanted to see decisions on drugs taken by the EU.

However, drugs policies remain in the hands of national governments and there are numerous legal differences in drugs-related practices in the member states.

Some countries, such as the Netherlands, have introduced a more liberal approach towards criminalisation of drug use over the years while medical treatment of drug addicts also differ across the continent.

"We do not want to get involved in an ideological debate with the member states...But that debate is coming closer", said a Commission official.

The most recent statistics show changing patterns in use of drugs across Europe.

While the use of heroine has gradually declined over the past years, the EU has become the world leader in the use of synthetic drugs, mainly ecstasy.

The number of people demanding treatment for cocaine addiction, as well as teenagers using cannabis is also rising significantly.

Differences in drug criminalisation
In most EU member states, the majority of reported drug law offences are related to drug use or possession for use, according to the 2004 Report by the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA).

However, in Italy and Spain those are not criminal offences, so all drug offences relate to dealing or trafficking.

Disparities across the member states also remain in punishment for different drugs-related offences.

The report suggested that some countries have changed their policies on the basis of impact research showing that stricter measures towards non-violent drug users did not lead to a reduction in drug use.

Different rules for treatment
The Commission says its plan to create minimal required conditions for drug treatment across the EU is to ensure that the fundamental rights of citizens are protected.

The EMCDDA report argues that drug-related treatment in general has moved away from hospitals into treatment centres in community settings. However, this trend has been less evident in the new member states, where psychiatric hospitals remain the primary treatment providers.

The same applies for "substitution treatment" which is used commonly for opiate users in the EU, apart from in the ten newcoming countries, where drug-free treatment options dominate.

The changes have been brought about by the influence of the Yankees [the United States]

Oh No!

Does this mean I will have to cancel my honeymoon?

'just say no' is my motto (unless it's the finest quality sensemillia)

Booking Details
Hotel: Victoria Hotel Amsterdam
Room type: Superior Double
Number of rooms: 1
Persons per room: 2
Arrival: 17 March 2005
Departure: 21 March 2005
Your question: Please arrange for Tea and Coffee making facilities in the room. *smoking*
Hotel Answer:

Dutch pot shops to fingerprint customers

AMSTERDAM, Netherlands - Coffee shops licensed to sell marijuana in the southern Dutch city of Maastricht will begin fingerprinting customers and scanning their IDs this summer to help prove they're following rules governing such sales.

In particular, the measures are expected to help stores show they are not selling to underage customers and that they haven't sold more than the maximum permitted to a customer on a given day.

"This is not something that we are doing willingly, but with pain in our hearts," Marc Josemans, chairman of the Union of Maastricht's Coffee Shops, said Wednesday. He said shops in Rotterdam and several Dutch border cities were considering following suit.

"We're very afraid we're going to lose customers over this, and to be honest we're even a little ashamed we're doing it, but the city of Maastricht has such harsh punishments that we don't feel we have any choice," Josemans told The Associated Press.

Marijuana is technically illegal in the Netherlands, but cities may license shops to sell no more than 5 grams per customer per day. The shops may not sell to anyone under 18, nor permit drugs other than marijuana or hashish on the premises.

Since Maastricht Mayor Gerd Leers took office in 2002, police have strictly enforced the rules, and shops found in violation are automatically closed for a minimum of three months for a single infraction, six months for a second offense, and permanently for a third.

As a result, 11 of Maastricht's 26 licensed shops have been closed, leaving just 15 open.

Under the new plan, fingerprints would be coupled with a digital photograph and a scan of customers' ID cards ?- removing all personal information except birth date ?- and stored on a computer system at the shop.

"We're not going to give this information to anybody else, and we're not linked to each other or the Internet," Josemans said.

Josemans, who is also owner of the "Easy Going" coffee shop, said the electronic system would be tested at his store Aug. 1 and used by all licensed stores by September.

He said the shops already have video surveillance cameras and cooperate with police in criminal investigations, but the stored fingerprints would be too low in quality for use by police.

Because of Maastricht's location near the border with Belgium and Germany and not far from France, the city of 120,000 residents gets 4.5 million "drugs tourists" a year who come just to buy weed and drive home.

City spokesman Math Wijnands said the drug trade brought a host of problems, most notably petty criminals who seek to sell marijuana or other drugs in the neighborhood of the licensed coffee shops.

"They know that they have a target group here, but they go about their business in an aggressive manner," Wijnands said. "That causes problems in the city center."

The city is negotiating to move more than half of the remaining shops to the outskirts of town ?- angering neighboring countries like Belgium who object to having what amount to marijuana drive-through stores on their doorsteps.

Wijnands said the city was aware of the plan by the shops to store customer data, and approved.

"If they're going to take ID checks into their own hands and obey the rules as much as possible, then that's only to be applauded," he said.

Josemans said the system had been vetted with the Netherlands' digital privacy watchdog, known by its Dutch acronym CBP, and did not violate any laws. A CBP spokeswoman could not immediately confirm that.

Dutch Declare Hallucinogenic Mushrooms Illegal

Associated Press
Saturday, October 13, 2007

AMSTERDAM, Oct. 12 -- The Netherlands will ban the sale of hallucinogenic mushrooms, the government announced Friday, tightening the country's famed liberal drug policies after the suicide of an intoxicated teenager.

Mushrooms "will be outlawed the same way as other drugs," Justice Minister Ernst Hirsch Ballin said. "The way we will enforce the ban is through targeting sellers."

Psilocybin, the main active chemical in the mushrooms, has been illegal under international law since 1971. But fresh, unprocessed mushrooms continued to be sold legally in the Netherlands along with herbal medicines in "smartshops," on the theory that it was impossible to determine how much psilocybin any given mushroom contains.

That meant mushrooms were less regulated than marijuana, which is technically illegal but sold openly in small amounts in "coffee shops." Possession of such "hard" drugs as cocaine, LSD and ecstasy is illegal.

The government has cracked down on hard drugs and tightened controls on marijuana. It was expected to do the same with mushrooms after the death of Gaelle Caroff, 17, who jumped from a building in March after eating psychedelic mushrooms. Caroff had suffered from psychological problems.

But the outright ban had not been expected: The government had solicited advice from vendors, advocacy groups and the city of Amsterdam, which benefits financially from drug-related tourism, on how to improve the situation.

Mushroom vendors suggested stricter ID controls to prevent underage buyers and strong warnings against mixing mushrooms with other drugs. Amsterdam Mayor Job Cohen had suggested a three-day "cooling off" period between ordering them and using them.

The Justice Ministry decided those measures did not go far enough.

About 500,000 "doses" of packaged mushrooms are sold annually in the Netherlands. According to a study published in January by Amsterdam's health services, the city's emergency services were summoned 148 times to deal with a bad reaction to mushrooms from 2004 to 2006. Of those cases, 134 involved foreigners, with Britons forming the largest group.

Denmark outlawed mushrooms in 2001, Japan in 2002, Britain in 2005 and Ireland in 2006. Selling mushrooms containing psilocybin is illegal in the United States, but the status varies from state to state for spores, homegrown species and wild species.

Murat Kucuksen, whose farm, Procare, supplies about half the psychedelic mushrooms on the Dutch market, predicted that the trade will move underground as a result of the ban. Prices will rise, and dealers will sell dried mushrooms or LSD as a substitute to tourists without offering any guidance, he said.

"So you'll have a rise in incidents, but they won't be recorded as mushroom-related, and the politicians can declare victory," he said.