UN SCOLDS CANADA'S INJECTION HAVENS

UNITED NATIONS - The UN's drug control agency is to warn Tony
Clement, the Health Minister, that Canada is flouting international
drug control treaties by enabling illicit drug use at a safe
injection site in Vancouver and through drug-paraphernalia giveaways elsewhere.

Mr. Clement will be urged to shut down the initiatives, which the
agency says effectively condone the use of drugs that Canada has
agreed in an international forum are banned without a prescription.

"In a way [Canada] is encouraging illicit trafficking," Zhu Li-Qin,
chief of the Convention Evaluation Section of the UN's International
Narcotics Control Board (INCB), said from the agency's headquarters in Vienna.

"Traffickers are searching for markets, and a [safe injection site]
serves as a small market where people go and legally inject drugs."

Article Four of the 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs says
countries will pass laws to make sure drugs are used only for medical
and scientific purposes.

"There can be interpretations of a treaty and disagreements on how it
should be implemented, but generally, in international law, when you
sign a treaty, you are supposed to conform both your domestic
legislation and your domestic behaviour to the obligations you have
under the treaty," said Melvyn Levitsky, a retired U.S. ambassador
who sits on the board.

"Although we understand the compulsion behind these sites, the
convention says drugs are supposed to be used for medical or
scientific purposes -- not for getting public nuisances off the streets."

Other countries facing board criticism for operating safe injection
sites are Australia, Germany, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway,
Spain and Switzerland.

"The board regrets that no measures have been taken to terminate the
operation of such facilities in the countries concerned," says the 2006 report.

The report was released this week in Vienna and Washington.

In its 2003 report, the board noted that the Canadian government,
then under a Liberal administration, had approved setting up the
Vancouver facility, Insite, which was billed as a "safe,
health-focused place where people can go to inject drugs."

In the latest report, the board expresses much greater alarm over the
continued existence of the facility and reports of drug-enabling
programs elsewhere, such as a crack pipe distribution initiative in Ottawa.

"The board is seriously concerned that several cities in Canada, in
addition to the heroin injection site in Vancouver, have planned to
distribute drug paraphernalia, including 'crack' pipes, to chronic
users," it says.

Stephane Dion, the Liberal leader, has promised funding for more
supervised injection sites, calling the Vancouver project "quite a
success," but the Conservative government has been more wary,
deferring a decision on whether to extend Insite's Health Canada
"exemption" until December.

"The bottom line is that we're interested in helping people to get
off drugs," said Erik Waddell, a spokesman for Mr. Clement.

Insite advocates fear that an expected shift toward more enforcement
in treating drug abuse in the government's upcoming National Drug
Strategy does not bode well for the future of the facility.

Neither Sam Sullivan, the Vancouver Mayor, nor his spokespeople
responded to a request for comment on the international legality of Insite.

INCB officials will notify Mr. Clement of the board's findings
through established contacts at Health Canada and directly to a
Canadian delegation attending the annual policy meeting of the
Commission on Narcotic Drugs in Vienna March 12-16.

Mr. Levitsky said countries that disagree with the treaty have an
opportunity to push for its modification through various international bodies.

International agreements allow for an array of drug treatment and
rehabilitation programs, including ones that might see substitute
drugs prescribed by doctors to help patients break their addictions.

Indeed, the board suggests drug treatment can still be progressive
without injection sites, highlighting in its 2004 report how Denmark
and Portugal opted against establishing them.