ZAGREB, Jan 31 (Hina) - Discussing a drug abuse prevention bill on Wednesday, parliament's House of Representatives concluded the rampant drug issue would not be solved as long as drug lords remained in power. Every party endorsed the
bill, but believes it needs fine-tuning. The manufacturing, trade and use of drugs is a big evil rapidly spreading across Croatia, said Krunoslav Gasparovic on behalf of the Croatian Democratic Union, the strongest opposition party. He added 4,699 new addicts were registered in 1999, of whom 40 died. He believes the bill deals more with drug manufacturing and trafficking than with prevention. We will have a hard time solving the problem unless we deal with the untouchability of drug dealers, said Nikola Ivanis of the PGS/SBHS bench. He inquired if it was true there was a connection between the drug lords and individuals in structures of authority, the interior ministry and the armed force
ZAGREB, Jan 31 (Hina) - Discussing a drug abuse prevention bill on
Wednesday, parliament's House of Representatives concluded the
rampant drug issue would not be solved as long as drug lords
remained in power.
Every party endorsed the bill, but believes it needs fine-tuning.
The manufacturing, trade and use of drugs is a big evil rapidly
spreading across Croatia, said Krunoslav Gasparovic on behalf of
the Croatian Democratic Union, the strongest opposition party. He
added 4,699 new addicts were registered in 1999, of whom 40 died. He
believes the bill deals more with drug manufacturing and
trafficking than with prevention.
We will have a hard time solving the problem unless we deal with the
untouchability of drug dealers, said Nikola Ivanis of the PGS/SBHS
bench. He inquired if it was true there was a connection between the
drug lords and individuals in structures of authority, the interior
ministry and the armed forces.
Petar Turcinovic of the Istrian Democratic Assembly suggested
confiscating the property of all who took part in the drug
distribution chain, and giving the money to prevention funds and
programmes.
All MPs are agreed more effort has to be invested in prevention
measures.
Some objected to the fact that the bill does not regulate the issue
of therapy communities which, according to Anto Kovacevic of the
Croatian Party of Rights/Croatian Christian Democratic Union
bench, do the lion's share of the rehabilitation work, without
supervision, insight or assistance from the state. When entering
rehabilitation programmes, addicts in general get fired and have
practically no right to sick leave.
Zrinjka Glovacki-Bernardi of the Croatian Social Liberal Party
bench believes the drug abuse problem cannot be solved without
elaborated mechanisms for the social reintegration of addicts.
The debate on the bill resumes in the afternoon.
Today, the lower house unanimously endorsed a bill on the
ecological manufacturing of agricultural food products, which was
debated last week, as well as an agriculture bill, and a bill on
freshwater fishing in first reading.
(hina) ha