The Russian War on Drugs

A Kinder, Gentler Approach?

Alexandra V. Orlova

Despite statements acknowledging the importance of treatment and rehabilitation, Russia still deals with its drug problem as a law enforcement matter.

the many problems the Russian Federation has faced since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 is the rising problem of illicit drugs. While president, Vladimir Putin called the rapid spread of illicit drugs through all of Russias regions a national crisis of staggering proportions, and presented the issue as a national security threat requiring an immediate governmental response.1 This article examines the drug situation in Russia both before and after the major reforms undertaken by the government in 2003in particular, the creation of the Federal Drug Control Agency (FSKN) and amendments to the drug-related provisions of the Criminal Code. While these reforms seemed to signal a fundamental shift in state drug-control policy, in practice law-enforcement bodies have continued to harass users and minor dealers rather than focus on harm reduction and rehabilitation.
MONG

Drug Market and Drug-Control Policies (19912003)

Illicit drugs were not a serious social problem in the Soviet era. Russia was not involved in international drug trafcking, and both the supply of and the demand for illegal drugs were very limited. The segments of the population that consumed illicit substances primarily relied on homemade and homegrown drugs.2 While the Soviet-Afghan war (197989) created a new class of (predominantly) heroin usersArmy veterans returning from AfghanistanAfghan-based drug supply networks had yet to penetrate Russian society.3 The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 ushered in a decade of political, economic, and social turbulence.

ALEXANDRA V. ORLOVA is an assistant professor in the Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology at Ryerson University in Toronto, Canada.

Problems of Post-Communism, vol. 56, no. 1, January/February 2009, pp. 2334. 2009 M.E. Sharpe, Inc. All rights reserved. ISSN 10758216 / 2009 $9.50 + 0.00. DOI 10.2753/PPC1075-8216560103

Orlova The Russian War on Drugs

23

This confusion, as well as the opening up of the former Soviet borders, also brought a signicant increase in the proportion of drugs trafcked from other countries.4 For example, in 1992 only 30 percent of all drugs seized in Russia came from other countries, while in 1999 the proportion had risen to between 60 percent and 80 percent.5 A signicant share of these foreign drugs came from Central Asia and Afghanistan, a trend that continues to the present day. Police corruption further boosted the supply network as local dealers (and in some instances even users) paid ofcers protection money to avoid being arrested.6 In addition to changes in the supply structure of the Russian drug market, the 1990s also saw an increase in the demand for illicit drugs. Intravenous drug use, especially heroin, became more widespread.7 While the use of cannabis still dominated, Drug use, including intravenous drug use, seem[ed] to involve youth from all social classes and ethnic groups.8 According to a 2002 study of the Russian Central Region, 63.4 percent of convictions under 228 of the Criminal Code (the section dealing with drug offenses) were people under thirty years of age.9 Drug use offered the poor an escape, however illusory, from the desperate socio-economic circumstances of the 1990s. For the wellto-do, it represented a means to imitate the West at a time when Western socio-cultural trends, including drug use, held great attraction for Russian youth (this trend was eventually eclipsed by nationalist sentiments).10 Many ofcial reports from Russian law-enforcement ofcials, as well as some academics, during these years claimed that organized-crime entities, integrated into large international drug cartels, had come to dominate the drug market.11 According to the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD), more than 4,000 criminal gangs . . . are dealing drugs in Russia, of whom more than 1,000 display apparent signs of organized criminal groups.12 Other studies undertaken in the 1990s, however, provided evidence suggesting that the structure of the Russian drug market was quite uid.13 Both high-level and low-level drug trafcking existed in Russia, with organized-crime groups cooperating with local military personnel, police, border guards, and customs service ofcials as well as other international organized-crime groups.14 The drug market also included many small-time independent dealers, as well as people who had no prior dealing experience but were simply trying to supplement their meager incomes.15 Hence, no one source monopolized the Russian drug market.16 It is difcult to precisely judge the extent of organized criminal entities in the Russian drug market. The MVDs claim that 1,600 criminal groups were involved in drug

trafcking in Russia has to be questioned on denitional grounds.17 The Russian Criminal Code provides a very vague denition of organized crime in 35.18 Prosecutors have to prove that a criminal group is either stable (35(3)) or cohesive (35(4)) in order to secure a conviction. Due to the vagueness of these terms, it was possible for law-enforcement ofcers to present a picture of organized-crime involvement that did not necessarily correspond with reality, as a drug transaction between the buyer and the seller or even the common purchase of illegal drugs by two users were considered sufcient to prove the existence of [an organized] group.19 In some cases, a person would be convicted as a member of an organized-crime group even when the quantity of seized drugs was minor and the defendants accomplices remained unknown.20 In addition to emphasizing the organized-crime dimension of the Russian drug market, authorities emphasized the ethnic component. Both the Federal Security Service (FSB) and the MVD focused on the prevalence of drug dealers of Georgian, Dagestani, Armenian, Uzbek, Kazakh, or Kyrgyz origin.21 They claimed that this ethnic involvement in drug dealing made it harder for law enforcement to penetrate drug-distribution networks.22 The role of ethnicities in the Russian drug market should not be overestimated. Admittedly, many ethnic minoritiesas well as members of the mainstream Russian populationwere involved in producing and selling illicit substances, in large measure due to the desperate economic situation in the 1990s and the need to turn to the illicit economy to survive because of an inability to obtain work or residence permits in Russia.23 However, the inordinate focus on non-Russian dealers stemmed in part from their visibility and pandered to the wider prejudices of the Russian population toward people from the Caucasus and Central Asia. Despite the ofcial rhetoric, and various governmental programs at the federal and regional levels that were supposed to tackle the issue of narcotics in a comprehensive manner, Russian policy was primarily directed at users, who bore the brunt of law-enforcement measures.24 For instance, On average . . . between 1990 and 1998, more than 77 percent of all registered drug offenses involved the mere possession of very small drug quantities without the purpose of sale.25 The purchase or simple possession of drugs without intent to sell was governed by 228(1) of the Russian Criminal Code. Under this section, prosecution was only supposed to occur if the purchase or possession of illegal drugs was on a large scale. However, the Permanent Committee on Drug Control of the Rus-

24

Problems of Post-Communism

January/February 2009

sian Ministry of Health quantied large scale at such low amounts that it virtually guaranteed the unimpeded prosecution of all users, with a possible penalty of up to three years in jail. The denitions of large scale for various psychoactive substances were modied several times.26 For example, in 1997, large scale constituted 0.1 gram of opium and any amount of heroin. In 1998, however, large scale for heroin was lowered to 0.005 gram on the recommendation of the Supreme Court and the Prosecutors Ofce. Some other examples of large scale include hashish (0.1 g), dried marijuana (0.1 g), and LSD (0.0001 g). These large amounts were signicantly below a users typical single dose. However, the chair of the Permanent Committee claimed that the amounts dened as large scale were based not only on medical criteria but also on the social dangerousness of various drugs.27 The component of social dangerousness was extended not only to drugs but also to drug users, who were regarded by the public and the authorities alike as threatening the stability of Russian society and, hence, were increasingly criminalized.28 Fearing such attitudes and harsh legal consequences, users avoided contact with governmental agencies, including state treatment centers.29 In any case, treatment methods in these underfunded and understaffed centers were primarily based on cold turkey withdrawal, since substitution treatment was and continues to be illegal, further limiting the attractiveness of state clinics to injecting drug users.30 Circumventing the states monopoly on treating drug-addicted individuals,31 private clinics started to offer rehabilitative rather than treatment services. Such private clinics had higher success rates but were expensive (some cost as much as $4,000$5,000 a month) and unattainable for most drug-addicted individuals and their families.32 Various comprehensive federal and regional governmental anti-drug programs developed in the 1990s also failed to affect the drug situation. These programs existed mostly on paper, and monies allocated to the regions under them frequently never made it to the local level.33 Moreover, the actions of the federal and regional agencies responsible for dealing with the drug problem were disjointed, lacked coordination, and suffered from a lack of professionalism. The philosophy as well as the major goals of Russias anti-drug policies did not change with the collapse of the Soviet Union. Instead, they continued to concentrate on eliminating drug trafc and consumption through repression and coercion.34 Moreover, given the grave economic situation after the collapse, the Russian public resented

governmental resources going to help drug addicts, who were not regarded as deserving any aid.35 Thus, both lawenforcement agents and the general population supported get tough strategies targeting drug users and dealers rather than prevention, treatment, or harm-reduction methods. Given the overwhelming focus on drug users and the predominance of law-enforcement methods in dealing with the drug problem in the 1990s and early 2000s, the comprehensive reform package introduced in 2003 seemed a welcome change. Two elements of this reform processthe creation of the FSKN and the amendments to the Criminal Code pertaining to usersare particularly noteworthy.

Federal Drug Control Agency

The Federal Drug Control Agency (FSKN) was created on July 1, 2003, and Viktor Cherkesov, a former high-ranking KGB ofcer and close political ally and friend of President Putin, was appointed chair.36 The FSKN has a staff of approximately 40,000 people, with regional branches throughout Russia.37 According to Putin himself, the creation of the agency signaled a shift in Russias anti-drug policy away from concentrating on prosecuting users to punishing dealers, dismantling organized criminal entities involved in drug trafcking, and combating drug-money laundering.38 In essence, the FSKN was supposed to serve a coordinating function in the battle against drugs.39 Cherkesov told Ekho Moskvy radio that the agency had been created in part because of the high levels of corruption in the agencies previously tasked with combating drug crimethe Ministry of the Interior (MVD), the Federal Security Service (FSB), and the Federal Customs Service.40 He indicated that because of the close linkage among drugs, trans-national organized crime, terrorism, and corruption, the FSKN plays a key role in Russian society.41 In 2006, he asserted that the agency was successfully executing its mandate to ght organized drug trafcking. In 2003, the law-enforcement authorities discovered 8,600 group drug crimes, in 200411,000, in 200512,800, and from January to August of 2006already 9,700 organized drug crimes. Similarly, in terms of drug money laundering, in 20022003 there was only one case of drug money laundering, in 2004 alone the FSKN discovered 314 cases of drug money laundering, in 20051,441, and for the rst eight months of 20061,332. 42 Despite its claims of success, and its rhetoric of concentrating on high-level dealers and organized crime, the FSKN quickly became entangled in a number of embarrassing incidents. For example, in late 2003 and early

Orlova The Russian War on Drugs

25

2004, FSKN agents arrested several veterinarians who were subsequently charged with trafcking in narcotics. A typical case involved a veterinarian receiving a phone call regarding an animal needing surgery. When the veterinarian arrived at the designated location and prepared to give the animal an injection of ketamine, a common narcotic used for anesthesia in Russia, he was detained by the undercover agents who had made the phone call in the rst place. Even though ketamine is widely used as an anesthetic in animal surgery, it was not included on the list of drugs allowed for use in veterinary practice.43 In total, the FSKN initiated twenty-one ketamine cases. On September 3, 2004, ketamine was nally added to the veterinary formulary.44 Later, the Plenum of the Supreme Court of Russia, in its resolution of June 15, 2006, stated that trafcking does not include the injection of drugs by veterinarians to animals in accordance with proper medical practice.45 Eventually, most of the vet cases fell apart. Although Cherkesov claimed that the ketamine situation was unfortunate, and that FSKN is primarily concerned with battling organized forms of drug crime rather than prosecuting individual minor violators, critics have accused the agency of using repressive methods.46 Its key strategies seem to be prosecution and imprisonment. In fact, Cherkesov and other senior FSKN ofcials have unequivocally denied that there is any benet to certain harm-reduction policies that have proven successful in ghting heroin addiction, such as methadone-substitution therapy.47 According to Cherkesov, There is no evidence of the effectiveness of methadone therapy for heroin users and such programs only aid in users developing other harmful dependencies.48 In another interview he said, Any talk of legalization of soft drugs is promoted by the drug lobby and that all drugs are harmful and all of them eventually kill people.49 In fact, both Putin and Cherkesov have stated that legalization of certain soft drugs would directly contravene Russias obligations under various international conventions.50 The FSKNs focus on prosecution and imprisonment (rather than treatment and prevention) as the means to solve Russias drug problem is not surprising, given Cherkesovs close ties to the power ministries and to Putin personally [and lack of] any specialized expertise in drug-related work,51 and that the majority of the 40,000-member staff was drawn primarily from law-enforcement agencies like the MVD or the now-defunct tax police.52 Although the FSKN claims that it focuses on stopping drug-related organized crime, many of its cases involve very small groups of people, sometimes even

families or individuals in dire economic circumstances.53 According to a senior ofcial of the Moscow branch of the agency, One of the most signicant cases [in 2007] constituted disbanding of an organized criminal group that was composed of a wife, a husband, and a wifes father that were trafcking drugs by mail.54 The FSKN frequently emphasizes the ethnicity of those detained on drug charges. For instance, according to an agency analysis of the available statistics, The Russian drug market is in large measure controlled by ethnically organized criminal groups.55 Both illegal and legal migration from countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States, primarily Central Asia, the North Caucasus, and nearby Afghanistan, is claimed to affect Russias drug situation in a major way.56 The work of the FSKN is further hampered by inghting among the security forces that are also partly responsible for combating Russias drug problem.57 Many in the MVD and the Federal Customs Service believed that the new agency was encroaching upon their spheres of inuence, since they already had structures in place to deal with drug trafcking.58 The inghting came to a head when several drug-enforcement ofcers from the FSKN were arrested on October 1, 2007, and accused of ordering illegal wiretaps and accepting bribes from private rms in exchange for ofcial protection. The drug-enforcement agents claimed, in turn, that the arrests were revenge by the FSB for [the agents] investigation into purported smuggling rings linked to the agency [i.e., the FSB].59 In an interview with Kommersant, Cherkesov echoed this charge, maintaining that the arrests of the drugenforcement ofcers revealed a bitter conict among the countrys special services and appeared to be retaliation by the FSB.60 Some outside observers viewed these arrests as an attempt to reduce Cherkesovs inuence on Putin before the 2008 presidential elections.61 Finally, Putin himself waded into the conict, criticizing Cherkesov for talking publicly about the dispute. He stated, It is wrong to bring these kinds of problems to the media, and denied any inghting.62 However, one day after reprimanding Cherkesov, Putin appointed him to head a new state committee to ght illegal drugs, possibly in an effort to display Putins neutrality in the ongoing conict among the security agencies.63 FSKN statements regarding its successful struggle against drug-related organized crime have to be examined critically. Moreover, the desire to retain their political and business inuences prompts various security agencies, including the FSKN, to continually justify their raison dtre.64 In other words, in order to justify its

26

Problems of Post-Communism

January/February 2009

existence, the FSKN paints a picture of drug crime that may not correspond with reality.65 Furthermore, linking drug crime to trans-national organized crime and international terrorism and presenting the drug problem as a national security threat makes it possible to sustain the appropriate level of moral panic needed to justify greater resource allocations to the FSKN and to justify its expansive mandate. 66

Criminal Code Reforms: Purposes and Practice

The 2003 amendments to the Criminal Code were supposed to shift the emphasis of law enforcement from users to dealers and trafckers.67 Section 228 of the Criminal Code was amended so that criminal responsibility for possession of narcotics without intent to engage in trafcking would only arise if the accused possessed large (228(1)) or especially large (228(2)) quantities of narcotics. These amounts were to be determined by the Ministry of Health, FSKN, and the Interior Ministry according to the minimum average dose for each drug. A large amount would be in excess of ten minimum average doses and an especially large amount would be more than fty minimum average doses.68 Perhaps not surprisingly, the minimum average dose amounts initially proposed were set extremely low. For example, the minimum average dose of heroin was set at 0.0001 grammuch lower than the 0.10.2 gram minimum average for a heroin user. In essence, the agencies set the minimum doses low enough to defeat the relatively liberal spirit of the Criminal Code amendments and enable them to continue the practice of prosecuting and criminalizing users found in possession of minute quantities of drugs.69 This way both the MVD and the FSKN could claim success in the war on drugs.70 The announcement of the minimum average doses sparked protests from academics, as well as from the Ministry of Justice, the Presidential Commission on Human Rights, and the Presidential Justice Commission.71 Efforts to develop more realistic minimum average doses were undertaken in consultation with criminologists, narcologists, and lawyers, taking into account studies of actual user practices.72 The new table of minimum average doses entered into force on May 12, 2004.73 The minimum average dose of heroin in the new table was raised to 0.1 gram, instead of the previous 0.0001 gram. Hence, for criminal liability to attach, the user must be found to be in possession of at least 1 gram of heroin for a large amount and at least 5 grams for an especially large amount.

Cherkesov publicly supported the new policy of not prosecuting users and instead focusing on dealers. He stated that the amendments to the Criminal Code were the correct course of action to pursue.74 However, despite his public pronouncements, other members of his agency as well as members of the MVD and the Prosecutor Generals Ofce set out to undermine the spirit of the amendments. They claimed that the Criminal Code amendments did not eliminate the potential dangers associated with drug users, such as spreading disease and committing violent crimes, and insisted that users should not be able to avoid punishment.75 FSKN ofcers lobbied members of the State Duma, Russian Orthodox Church leaders, as well as the public, collecting 200,000 signatures in favor of continuing to prosecute users.76 They claimed that criminal elements were behind the amendments, in order to complicate efforts to battle the spread of drugs.77 After extensive FSKN lobbying, further amendments to the Criminal Code in February 2006 re-instituted the policy of basing large and especially large quantities on absolute amounts rather than on minimum average doses.78 The result was that the concepts of large and especially large amounts, while not as restrictive as in the 1990s, were much more restrictive than the amounts set under the minimum average doses regime. For example, under the 2006 amendments, the large dose of heroin was set at 0.5 gram and especially large dose at 2.5 grams (contrast this with the 1.0- and 5.0-gram levels, respectively, under the 2003 amendments). Several justications were advanced for the 2006 amendments. Advocates maintained that it was difcult to calculate minimum average doses because of the conicting medical, social, and legal criteria, that minimum average dose is an appropriate concept regarding licit drugs but inappropriate in the context of illicit drugs, and nally, that it is difcult to determine and compare the impact of different types of drugs upon individuals and, hence, to calculate their dangerousness in minimum average doses.79 Overall, the 2006 amendments represented a step backward from treating users as victims rather than perpetrators.80

The New Federal Anti-Drug Program

The amended 228 of the Criminal Code and subsequent FSKN activities reveal the mainly punitive approach of the 2003 drug reforms.81 The focus on law enforcement has not yielded the desired results, however, as even the Russian government has acknowledged. The 20052009 federal anti-drug program, for example, notes, Decades

Orlova The Russian War on Drugs

27

of past practices mainly centered on law-enforcement methods in combating the drug problem have proven ineffective. Despite the large number of individuals convicted for drug offenses (approximately 100,000 a year) and the increase in funds directed to law-enforcement agencies, the drug situation in the country has not improved.82 It recommends a series of comprehensive measures, including projects aimed at prevention, treatment, and rehabilitation.83 Despite the participation of non-law-enforcement agencies, such as the Ministry of Health and Social Development, the Ministry of Culture, the Ministry of Education and Science, the Ministry of Sports, Tourism, and Youth, and the Ministry of Telecommunications, it is clear from reviewing the list of activities under this program that the FSKN, the MVD, the FSB, the Ministry of Defense, and the Federal Customs Service will be responsible for bulk of the projects.84 For example, the FSKN, which developed the program and serves as the coordinating agency, is supposed to conduct educational conferences aimed at prevention, create an on-line consultation service directed at preventing drug use and promoting treatment, create governmental research centers to study issues of prevention, liaise with non-governmental organizations, and even create computer games and movies aimed at reducing drug use.85 Moreover, despite governmental rhetoric trumpeting prevention, treatment, and rehabilitation in the anti-drug program, most of the federal funds for anti-drug efforts still go to law-enforcement agencies rather than to nancing preventative measures.86 Under the program law-enforcement agencies are scheduled to receive more than 60 percent of federal funding, with the largest share going to the FSKN.87 The perpetuation of the predominantly punitive approach in the federal antidrug program is not surprising, as it has been practiced for decades and past practices are often difcult to break, especially if they involve shifting funds and priorities.

Did the Reforms Work?

Russian authorities present the countrys drug problem in an unsophisticated way. Drugs of various categories are lumped together, and all users are labeled addicts and therefore socially dangerous.88 Such labeling is extremely harmful, as it further isolates users and addicts from society and promotes already negative public attitudes toward those who use drugs, making it hard for recovering addicts to integrate back into the community.89 The ofcial drug discourse is moralistic, medicalized, and criminalizing, and the consequences of drug use are presented as a threat to the security of the nation.90 One

of the key impediments to prevention and rehabilitation is the requirement, arising from the states monopoly on drug treatment, that addicts who seek assistance ofcially register as drug dependent, which exposes them to discrimination and harassment.91 Users and their relatives rarely seek help from state institutions to avoid the stigma attached to registration.92 Moreover, individuals with drug problems do not want to seek treatment in state facilities because of the prison-like conditions in the clinics and the treatment based on complete abstinence.93 Furthermore, referral to a state clinic may mean that an individual can be deported for having no valid immigration status. Meanwhile, the role of the non-governmental sector in assisting addicts is rather limited. While private clinics have higher success rates for rehabilitation, they operate in a precarious legal gray zone, because they are not authorized to provide treatment under the 1998 Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances law, and managers frequently must bribe the authorities to close their eyes to the clinics activities. 94 Users and minor dealers, not organized criminal entities, continue to be the primary targets of state anti-drug measures.95 These individuals populate ofcial drug statistics, despite FSKN rhetoric regarding its anti-organizedcrime drug efforts.96 Frequently, police detain drug users to fulll their arrest quotas, and drug-enforcement agents have been known to actively entrap users into committing offenses for the purposes of statistical manipulation.97 Moreover, drug cases are notorious for procedural violations by the MVD and the FSKN.98 For example, searches are conducted without requisite search warrants.99 In some cases, criminal proceedings are not opened because of corruption in the agencies responsible for drug control, while in other instances, several separate cases will be opened against the same individual (or group of individuals) to inate statistical data.100 Moreover, police ofcers themselves often sell drugs and take bribes not to launch criminal investigations.101 More broadly, the drug situation in Russia continues to negatively affect the countrys demographics and the future of its economy.102 Intravenous drug use is increasing among the younger population: The number of adolescents who suffer from drug abuse has increased by 14.8 percent since the late 1990s. Currently about two-thirds of the narcotics abusers [are] between the ages of eighteen and thirty.103 The increase in drug use has contributed to the spread of HIV/AIDS and other diseases. Eighty percent of the people infected with HIV/AIDS are intravenous drug users.104 While those infected at the beginning of the AIDS epidemic in Russia were predominantly male, more

28

Problems of Post-Communism

January/February 2009

and more females are becoming infected through either intravenous drug use or sexual intercourse with infected partners.105 Of 415,000 people infected with AIDS in Russia today, 135,000 (32 percent) are women.106 Most of these women are young (between the ages of twenty and twenty-nine), and around 5,000 found out that they were infected while undergoing blood tests as part of prenatal care.107 The cost to the state of the drug problem is substantial: more than 1 billion rubles per year to treat drug-addicted individuals in state clinics.108 Despite this nancial expenditure, most drug-addicted individuals refuse to utilize state facilities for treatment, and of those admitted for treatment, the success rates tend to be quite low.109 In addition to the devastating impact of drug trafcking and drug use on the countrys demographics and economy, the number of drug-related offenses has also risen, especially among those under the age of thirty, further costing the state. 110 Russias anti-drug efforts to date lack conceptual clarity, exhibit no clear sense of direction or priorities, and rely more on bombastic rhetoric than substantive efforts to achieve their professed goals.111 They have done little to mitigate the grave economic, demographic, and criminological impact of the drug situation. Nevertheless, repressive measures remain the preferred method in the federal agencies responsible for dealing with the drug problem, regardless of presidential pronouncements that prosecutions alone are not the solution.

A Distinctly Russian Approach?

Russias anti-drug policies and the rhetoric surrounding its war on drugs are certainly not unique. Putin called the drug problem a national crisis of staggering proportions, and it has been presented as a national security threat. Similarly, the United States regards drugs as a security issue, emphasizing the links between the drug trade and international terrorism and trans-national organized crime.112 Drugs are dened as threatening the very essence of U.S. society, necessitating more militarized law enforcement, tougher sentences, and greater rates of imprisonment.113 However, as in Russia, The vast majority of those being arrested and convicted of drug violations in the United States are simply users or small-time dealers rather than high-level criminal kingpins.114 In essence, both the United States and Russia have turned the war on drugs into a war on drug users, with emphasis on prevention, prohibition, and punishment, rather than rehabilitation.115 In both countries, most of the nancial resources allocated to battling drugs go to

criminal justice agencies.116 This criminal justiceoriented approach leads to the marginalization of users, presenting them as a threat to their families and to society at large and retarding their reintegration into the community.117 For the most part, blame is placed on the individual rather than certain social structures. In other words, the war on drugs avoids a structural analysis of the problem and instead pathologizes individuals. The drug addict becomes the enemy, the threatening other, who is waiting to destroy freedom, democracy, and the nations way of life. Tough anti-drug measures, frequently directed against users, are justied as necessary in order to protect the core values of the country. 118 This user-centric approach also criminalizes large sections of the population, especially ethnic minorities and the poor. Drug-enforcement agents in both countries are under pressure to show results in the war on drugs, causing them to target already disadvantaged segments of the population, such as poor urban blacks in the United States and legal and illegal immigrants from Central Asia and the North Caucasus in Russia.119 The dramatic rise in U.S. incarceration rates, for example, can be directly traced to the war on drugs and associated sentencing practices, not to changes in the level or nature of crime itself. 120 While the spread of HIV infections has forced a pragmatic shift in the drug policies of some countries away from simple criminalization toward harm-reduction policies,121 both the United States and Russia continue to emphasize prosecution and imprisonment. While many front-line workers, such as police ofcers, prosecutors, and judges, as well as academics, criticize the warcentered drug-control strategy and call for a change in policy,122 both Moscow and Washington continue to be quite critical of harm-reduction policies.123 In Russia, FSKN head Cherkesov has voiced very negative attitudes toward methadone and needle-exchange programs.124 Similarly in the United States, President George H.W. Bush stated that the United States cannot allow our concern for AIDS to undermine our determination to win the war on drugs and that there is no getting around the fact that distributing needles facilitates drug use and undercuts the credibility of societys message that using drugs is illegal and morally wrong.125 President Bill Clintons drug czar, General Barry McCaffrey, remarked, The problem isnt dirty needles; its injection of illegal drugs.126 While campaigning for president in fall 2000, George W. Bush told the AIDS Foundation of Chicago:
I do not favor needle-exchange programs and other socalled harm reduction strategies to combat drug use. I support a comprehensive mix of prevention, education,

Orlova The Russian War on Drugs

29

treatment, law enforcement, and supply interdiction to curb drug use and promote a healthy, drug-free America, not misguided efforts to weaken drug laws . . . needle exchange programs signal nothing but abdication, that these dangers are here to stay.127

Conclusion
Russians must begin to ask hard questions about the effectiveness of traditional law-enforcement methods as a way to prevent drug abuse.135 Currently, however, there is very little political will to fundamentally rethink the governments approach to the drug problem. Despite presidential pronouncements regarding the importance of treatment and rehabilitation,136 the drug problem is still primarily approached from a law-enforcement perspective, and the importance of harm-reduction policies as well as the important role that non-state actors could play is disregarded. Moreover, resolving the drug problem may not be the main reason behind declarations of tough measures against drugs.137 Various political agendas are often pursued under the guise of the war on drugs. Some politicians use anti-drug rhetoric to win favor with their constituents, because public attitudes toward drug addicts remain quite harsh.138 Anti-immigration policies can be advanced under the banner of drug control if ethnicminority immigrants are presented as responsible for Russias crime problems. The Kremlin may also be using the war-cry of combating drugs to reassert its inuence in the former Soviet states, subsuming this social problem into a broader security agenda when dealing with its neighbors.139 Ultimately, Russias approach to its war on drugs satises many different agendas and is unlikely to change in the near future. After all, the problem with conceptual wars is that there is no timetable, little accountability, and unfullled promises of ultimate victory.140 Notes
1. Quoted in Svante E. Cornell and Niklas L.P. Swanstrom, The Eurasian Drug Trade: A Challenge to Regional Security, Problems of Post-Communism 53, no. 4 (2006): 15. 2. Vladimir B. Poznyak, Vadim E. Pelipas, Anatoliy N. Vievski, and L. Miroshnichenko, Illicit Drug Use and Its Health Consequences in Belarus, Russian Federation, and Ukraine: Impact of Transition, European Addiction Research 8 (2002): 185. 3. Tamara Makarenko, Crime, Terror, and the Central Asian Drug Trade, Harvard Asia Quarterly 6, no. 3 (2002). 4. B.P. Tselinskii, Sovremennaia narkosituatsiia v Rossii: Tendentsii i perspektivy (Current Drug Situation in Russia: Tendencies and Prospects), Organizovannaia prestupnost i korruptsia 4 (2003): 21. 5. Ibid.; K. Khachatourian, Kriminologicheskaia kharakteristika nezakonnogo obotota narkotikov v Rossiiskoi Federatsii v 1999 godu (Criminological Characteristics of the Illegal Drug Trafc in the Russian Federation in 1999), Voprosy narkologii 1 (2000): 1319. 6. Letizia Paoli, The Development of an Illegal Market: Drug Consumption and Trade in Post-Soviet Russia, British Journal of Criminology 42 (2002): 27. 7. Tselinskii, Sovremennaia narkosituatsiia v Rossii, p. 21. 8. Paoli, Development of an Illegal Market, p. 23. 9. Abdula G. Museibov, Regionalnye praktiki po preduprezhdeniu nezakonnogo oborota narkotikov (Regional Practices Aimed at Preventing Illegal Drug Trafc), Sotsiologicheskie issledovaniia 7 (2003): 127.

He remained true to his word after his election. In 2001 Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy Thompson said that the Bush administration had no plans to permit federal funding of needle-exchange programs.128 As these statements show, getting tough on users and dealers remains the national strategy in both countries, notwithstanding the lack of visible success in stemming rising HIV rates.129 The emphasis on criminal justice measures and the refusal to discuss alternative strategies in the war on drugs is frequently justied in both the United States and Russia by referring to their international obligations under various anti-drug instruments, in particular the 1988 UN Convention Against the Illicit Trafc in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances.130 However, despite the strongly prohibitive language of these international instruments,131 some countries that favor a shift to less harsh measures manage to present their case not as a departure from the standards set by the conventions but as a broader elaboration of the standards. For example,
De facto legalization [of cannabis] can be achieved by keeping the possession of drugs for personal consumption a criminal offence as required by the 1988 Convention, but without outing the letter of the Convention. Means of doing this may involve an adjustment to the penalties that are deemed appropriate, such as a ne, police caution, an unrecorded reprimand or counseling; or the drugs concerned may be reclassied into different legal categories where different penalties apply. This does not mean that possession has been legalized and it allows the continued, possibly more forceful prosecution of trafcking or production.132

Both the Netherlands and the United Kingdom are experimenting with this type of non-enforcement. The Dutch have adopted a pragmatic approach to their drug problem, based on harm reduction and social integration of users.133 Similarly, the UKs drug-control strategy focuses more on harm minimization and deemphasizing action in relation to drug users who consume cannabis or other drugs relatively unproblematically.134 Hence, the language of the conventions to which Russia is a party is not an insurmountable impediment to developing antidrug strategies that do not center around prohibition and imprisonment.

30

Problems of Post-Communism

January/February 2009

10. Letizia Paoli, The Price of Freedom: Illegal Drug Markets and Policies in Post-Soviet Russia, Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 582 (2002): 17071. 11. Museibov, Regionalnye praktiki po preduprezhdeniu nezakonnogo oborota narkotikov, p. 126; Letizia Paoli, Drug Trafcking in Russia: A Form of Organized Crime? Journal of Drug Issues 31, no. 4 (2001): 1008. 12. Quoted in John M. Kramer, Drug Abuse in Russia. Emerging Pandemic or Overhyped Diversion? Problems of Post-Communism 50, no. 6 (2003): 18. 13. Paoli, Price of Freedom, p. 174; UN Ofce on Drug Control and Crime Prevention, Annual Field Report 2000: Russia (New York: UNODCCP, 2001). 14. Louise Shelley, The Drug Trade in Contemporary Russia, China and Eurasia Forum Quarterly 4, no. 1 (2006): 16, 18. 15. Tselinskii, Sovremennaia narkosituatsiia v Rossii, p. 22. 16. Shelley, Drug Trade in Contemporary Russia, p. 17. 17. Paoli, Development of an Illegal Market, p. 32. 18. Alexandra V. Orlova and James W. Moore, Umbrellas or Building Blocks? Dening International Terrorism and Transnational Organized Crime in International Law, Houston Journal of International Law 27, no. 2 (2005): 294. 19. Paoli, Drug Trafcking in Russia, p. 1014. 20. Ibid., p. 1015. 21. Ibid., p. 1023. 22. Tselinskii, Sovremennaia narkosituatsiia v Rossii, p. 23. 23. Paoli, Drug Trafcking in Russia, pp. 102324; Vladimir Paramonov and Aleksei Strokov, Raspad SSSR i ego posledstviia dlia Uzbekistana: Ekonomika i sotsialnaia sfera (The Consequences of the Fall of the USSR for Uzbekistans Economic and Social Spheres), Conict Studies Research Centre, Central Asian Series, April 2006, 06/11(R). 24. L.I. Romanova, Antinarkoticheskie programmy dolzhny byt effektivnymi (Anti-Drug Programs Must Be Effective), Rossiiskii uridicheskii zhurnal 3 (2006): 103; Museibov, Regionalnye praktiki po preduprezhdeniu nezakonnogo oborota narkotikov, p. 128. 25. Paoli, Price of Freedom, p. 176. 26. V. Voronin, Opredelit zakonom krupnyi razmer narkoticheskikh sredstv (The Law Needs to Set the Meaning of Large Amounts of Narcotic Substances), Rossiiskaia ustitsiia 2 (2003): 43. 27. E.A. Babayan, Billuten verhovnogo suda Rossiiskoi Federatsii (Bulletin of the Russian Supreme Court) 10 (1998): 1417. 28. Voronin, Opredelit zakonom krupnyi razmer narkoticheskikh sredstv, p. 43. 29. Poznyak et al., Illicit Drug Use and Its Health Consequences, p. 187. 30. Federal Law on Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances, No. 3-FZ, January 8, 1998, 31. 31. Ibid., 55(2). 32. Poznyak et al., Illicit Drug Use and Its Health Consequences, p. 187. 33. Romanova, Antinarkoticheskie programmy dolzhny byt effektivnymi, 105. 34. R.A. Aleksandrov, Stanovlenie i razvitie ugolovno-pravovogo protivodeistviia nezakonnomu oborotu narkotikov v SSSR v 2030-e gody XX veka (Establishment and Development of the Criminal-Legal Opposition to the Illicit Trafc in Narcotics in the USSR During the 1920s and 1930s), Istoriia gosudarstva i prava 6 (2007): 1719; Paoli, Price of Freedom, p. 175. 35. Romanova, Antinarkoticheskie programmy dolzhny byt effektivnymi, p. 108. 36. The ofcial resolution creating the agency was published in Rossiiskaya gazeta (June 11, 2003): 9. 37. Kramer, Drug Abuse in Russia, p. 20. 38. Internet Conference of the President of the Russian Federation V.V. Putin (July 6, 2006), www.narkotiki.ru.

39. D.S. Novikov, Problemmy prolaktiki narkomanii (Problems of Addiction Prevention), in Materialy nauchno-prakticheskoi konferentsii Kaliningradskogo Uridicheskogo Institute MVD Rosii. Teoriia i praktika pravookhranitelnoi deiatelnosti (Conference Materials of the Kaliningrad MVD Law Institute, entitled Theory and Practice of Law Enforcement Activities) (Kaliningrad, 2006), p. 157. 40. Viktor Cherkesov, Strana otoshla ot kriticheskogo poroga (The Country Has Moved Away from a Critical Mark), Nezavisimaya gazeta (November 20, 2006). 41. Viktor Cherkesov, Glavnoi prichinoi usugubleniia narkoobstanovki stali vneshnie prichiny (External Forces Play the Main Role in the Worsening of the Drug Situation), interview on Echo Moskvy Radio (July 1, 2004), www.narkotiki.ru. 42. Zasedanie pravitelstvennoi komissii po protivodeistviu zloupotrebleniu narkoticheskimi sredstvami i ikh nezakonnomu oborotu (Session of the Governmental Commission on Preventing Illicit Drug Use and Trafcking), September 18, 2006, www.narkotiki.ru. 43. Semeyon Gorelik, Sbyval narkotik putem inektsii koshke (Drug Trafcking by Way of an Injection to a Cat), February 2, 2004, www.utro.ru. 44. Pravitelstvo RF uzakonilo ispolzovanie ketamina v veterinarii (Government Legalized the Use of Ketamine in Veterinary Practice), September 6, 2004, www.newsru.com. 45. Verhovnyi Sud postavil tochku v ketaminovykh delakh (Supreme Court Reached a Conclusion in the Ketamine Process), July 14, 2006, www. regnum.ru. 46. Viktor Cherkesov, Kak sdelat borbu s narkotikami effektovnoi? (How to Make the Anti-Drug Struggle Effective?), interview on Echo Moskvy Radio (November 30, 2006), www.narkotiki.ru. 47. Stenogramma internet-konferentsii s nachalnikom upravleniia mezhvedomstvennogo vzaimodeistviia v sfere prolaktiki FSKN RF Aleksandrom Sergeevichem Yanevskim (Record of the Internet Conference with the Head of the Addiction Prevention Division of the FSKN, Alexander Sergeevich Yanevskii), February 22, 2007, www.narkotiki.ru; Poznyak et al., Illicit Drug Use and Its Health Consequences, p. 188; Marisa L. Maskas, Trafcking Drugs: Afghanistans Role in Russias Current Drug Epidemic, Tulsa Journal of Comparative and International Law 13 (2005): 17475. 48. Cherkesov, Glavnoi prichinoi usugubleniia narkoobstanovki stali vneshnie prichiny. 49. Cherkesov, Strana otoshla ot kriticheskogo poroga. 50. Putin Internet Conference. 51. Olga Krychtanovskaya and Stephen White, Inside the Putin Court: A Research Note, Europe-Asia Studies 57, no. 7 (2005): 106575. 52. Kramer, Drug Abuse in Russia, p. 20. 53. Desiat mesiatsev odnogo goda (Ten Months of One Year), Chelovek i zakon 12 (2005); R.A. Aleksandrov, Vzaimosviaz narkobiznesa i natsionalnoi bezopasnosti Rossii (Connection Between the Drug Business and Russias National Security), Rossiiskii sledovatel (Russian Inspector) 2 (2006): 55; Cherkesov, Kak sdelat borbu s narkotikami effektovnoi? 54. Aleksandr Birin, S nachala 2007 goda v Moskve vyiavleno pochti 1200 prestuplenii v sfere nezakonnogo oborota narkotikov (From the Beginning of 2007 There Have Been 1200 Crimes Committed in Moscow Connected with Drug Trafcking), www.narkotiki.ru. 55. Federalnaia Sluzhba po Narkokontrolu informituet (The FSKN Informs), November 16, 2007, www.narkotiki.ru. 56. Cherkesov, Glavnoi prichinoi usugubleniia narkoobstanovki stali vneshnie prichiny; idem, Kak sdelat borbu s narkotikami effektovnoi?; A.E. Kudrov, Osobennosti prokurorskogo nadzora za deiatelnostu pravookhranitelnykh organov pri rassledovanii prestuplenii v sfere nezakonnogo oborota narkotikov (The Specics of Prosecutor Supervision over Actions of Law Enforcers in Investigations of Crimes Connected with Drug Trafcking), in Materialy nauchno-prakticheskoi konferentsii Kaliningradskogo Uridicheskogo Institute MVD Rosii, p. 82. 58. David Nowak, 5 Drug Ofcers Found Guilty of Assaulting Transport Cops, Moscow Times (October 16, 2007): 3. 59. Francesca Mereu, Drug Cops Arrest Under Appeal, Moscow Times (October 17, 2007): 3.

Orlova The Russian War on Drugs

31

60. Viktor Cherkesov, Nelzia dopustit, chtoby voiny prevratilis v torgovtsev (Preventing Turning Warriors into Traders), Kommersant (October 9, 2007). 61. FSB vziala v oborot narkotiki (FSB Clamped Down on Drugs), Kommersant (October 4, 2007). 62. Prezident ne sognul svoi liniu (President Did Not Depart from His View), Kommersant (October 19, 2007). 63. Francesca Mereu and Kevin OFlynn, In Turf War, Putin Scolds Ally and Gives Him a Job, Moscow Times (October 22, 2007): 1; Ukaz Prezidenta RF (Presidential Decree) O dopolnitelnykh merakh po protivodeistviu nezakonnomu oborotu narkoticheskikh sredstv, psikhotropnykh veschestv i ikh prekursorov (On Additional Measures to Combat Illicit Trafc in Drugs, Psychotropic Substances and Their Precursors), October 20, 2007. 64. Under Putin, control of the commanding heights of the Russian economy was transferred from the oligarchs to individuals in the security services; see Daniel Treisman, Putins Silovarchs, Orbis 51, no. 1 (2007): 146. While oligarchs actually owned billion-dollar properties outright, individuals from the power ministries mostly just control companies through positions in management or on supervisory boards. Dmitry Medvedevs succession to the presidency and Putins shift to the prime ministers ofce has created a sense of instability in the security agencies and fears that they might lose political power and inuence and, hence, control over their businesses (both legal and semi-legitimate; see Pavel K. Baev, Inghting Among Putins Siloviki Escalates to a Clan War, Eurasia Daily Monitor (October 11, 2007); Francesca Mereu, Security Inghting All About Money, Moscow Times (October 29, 2007): 1. 65. I.I. Ibragimov, Borba s nezakonnym oborotom narkoticheskikh sredstvDelo vsego rossiiskogo obschestva (Combating the Illicit Trafcking of Drugs Is a Matter for the Whole Russian Society), Pravo i obrazovanie 2 (2007): 175. 66. R.A. Aleksandrov, Vzaimosviaz narkobiznesa i natsionalnoi bezopasnosti Rossii (Connection Between Drug Business and Russias National Security), Rossiiskii sledovatel 2 (2006): 55; E.A. Stepanova, Narkotiki i terrorizm (Drugs and Terrorism), Mirovaia ekonomika i mezhdunarodnye otnosheniia 8 (2006). 67. See Federal Law No. 162-FZ On Additions and Amendments to the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, December 8, 2003; S 12 Marta kazhdyi potrebitel narkotikov v Rossii mozhet byt avtomaticheski priravnen k narkobaronu (Commencing March 12 Every Russian User Can Be Automatically Equated with a Drug Trafcker), March 3, 2004, www.regnum.ru. 68. 228, no. 2; A.I. Chuchaev, Postateinyi kommentarii k ugolovnomu kodeksu Rossiiskoi Federatsii (Section by Section Commentary to the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) (Moscow, 2004), pp. 512, 516; users would be liable for up to three years deprivation of liberty for possession of a large quantity of narcotics and from three to ten years deprivation of liberty for possession of an especially large quantity of narcotics; see 228(1) and (2); Komissiia po pravam Cheloveka pri prezidente RF obratilas k premeru s prosboi podderzhat priniatie realnykh razmerov razovykh doz narkotikov (Presidential Human Rights Commission Asked the Prime Minister to Support the Enactment of Realistic Measurements of Single Use Doses of Drugs), March 11, 2004, www.regnum.ru. 69. Komissiia po pravam Cheloveka pri prezidente RF obratilas k premeru s prosboi podderzhat priniatie realnykh razmerov razovykh doz narkotikov. 70. S 12 Marta kazhdyi potrebitel narkotikov v Rossii mozhet byt avtomaticheski priravnen k narkobaronu. 71. Grazhdanskii kontrol: Gosnarkokontrol na trope voiny? (FSKN Is on the War Path?), Prava cheloveka v Rossii (October 16, 2007). 72. Olga Bobrova, Deputaty nervno kuriat (Deputies Are Nervously Smoking), Novaya gazeta (September 15, 2005); Krupnyi i osobo krupnyi razmer narkoticheskikh i psikhotropnykh veschestv budut ischisliat v ziologicheski obosnovannykh razovykh dozakh (Large and Especially Large Amounts of Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Will Be Calculated Taking Account of Physiologically Reasonable Single Use Doses), Regnum News Agency, May 12, 2004, www.regnum.ru. 73. Postanovlenie Pravitelstva Rossiiskoi Federatsii N. 231, Ob utverzhdenii razmerov srednikh razovykh doz narkoticheskikh sredstv i psikhotropnykh veschetsv dlia tselei statei 228, 228.1 and 229 UK RF (Instruction of the Federal Government No. 231, Conrmation of the Minimum Average Doses

of Drugs and Psychotropic Substances for Sections 228, 228.1 and 229 of the Criminal Code), May 12, 2004. 74. Cherkesov, Glavnoi prichinoi usugubleniia narkoobstanovki stali vneshnie prichiny. It is not surprising that Cherkesov, in his public statements, spoke in favor of the amendments, because the policy of putting the emphasis on dealers instead of users came from Putin himself. Putin, in his 2005 State of the Union address, stated, The problem of drugs cannot be solved by prohibition alone, quoted in Ischeznet li iz ugolovnogo kodeksa poniatie srednei razovoi dozy narkotikov? (Will the Criterion of Minimum Average Dose Disappear from the Criminal Code?), Regnum News Agency, April 28, 2005, www.regnum.ru. 75. I. Rezonov, Organizatsiia i soderzhanie narkopritonov: Vyiavlenie i raskrytie (Organization and Direction of Drug Dens: Investigation and Disclosure), Zakonnost 4 (2006): 27; E.N. Pashkova, Sistema mer preduprezhdeniia prestuplenii, sovershaemykh na pochve narkomanii. Mesto i rol v nei sredstv administrativno-pravovogo vozdeistviia (The System of Measures Directed at Prevention of Drug Crimes. The Place and Role of Legal-Administrative Measures), Chelovek: Prestuplenie i nakazanie 23 (2006): 8081. 76. Bobrova, Deputaty nervno kuriat; Ischeznet li iz ugolovnogo kodeksa poniatie srednei razovoi dozy narkotikov? 77. Postanovlenie pravitelstva RF o srednikh razovykh dozakh narkoticheskikh sredstv protolknulo lobbi prestupnogo mira (The Instruction of the Federal Government Dealing with the Amounts of Minimum Average Doses of Drugs Was Sponsored by the Criminal Lobby), Federal Agency of the Press and Mass Communications, November 17, 2004, www.narkotiki.ru; Vyacheslav N. Kurchenko, Novatsii v sudebnoi praktike po delam o nezakonnom oborote narkotikov (Innovations in Court Practice Dealing with Drug Trafcking Cases), Ugolovnyi protsess 10 (2006): 3. 78. Postanovlenie Pravitelstva N. 76 (Governmental Instruction No. 76), February 7, 2006. 79. Gosduma gotova otkazatsia ot poniatiia srednikh razovykh doz narkotikov (State Duma Is Ready to Abandon Minimum Average Doses), Regnum News Agency, September 21, 2005, www.regnum.ru. 80. I.M. Kleimenov and D.U. Artemov, Strategii protivodeistviia nezakonnomu oborotu narkotikov (Strategies Aimed at Combating Illicit Drug Trafc), Rossiiskaia ustitsia 2 (2007): 63. 81. Yevgenii I. Tsymbala, Pravovoe regulirovanie okazaniia narkologicheskoi pomoskhi: Problemy i puti ikh resheniia (Legal Regulation of Provision of Aid to Drug Dependent Individuals. Problems and Their Resolutions), Federal Agency of the Press and Mass Communications, December 23, 2005, www.narkotiki.ru. 82. Federalnaia tselevaia programma Kompleksnye mery protivodeistviia zloupotrebleniu narkotikami i ikh nezakonnomu oborotu na 20052009 gody (Federal Program Titled Comprehensive Measures to Combat Illicit Drug Use and Drug Trafc for 20052009), Postanovlenie N. 561 (Instruction No. 561), September 13, 2005, www.narkotiki.ru/jrussia_5991.html. 83. See Perechen meropriiatii po realizatsii federalnoi tselevoi programmy Kompleksnye mery protivodeistviia zloupotrebleniu narkotikami i ikh nezakonnomu oborotu na 20052009 gody (List of Events Directed at the Realization of the Federal Program Titled Comprehensive Measures to Combat Illicit Drug Use and Drug Trafc for 20052009), www.narkotiki. ru/tabs/fcp2005pril2.html. 84. Even these non-law-enforcement bodies frequently display support for the law-enforcement approach. For example, in a 2005 interview, the minister of education and science expressed his support for some forms of mandatory drug testing for students; see Internet press-konferentsiia ministra obrazovaniia i nauki R.F. Fursenko (Internet Press Conference of Minister of Education and Science R.F. Fursenko), September 26, 2005, www.mon.gov.ru/press/ news/1680; see also Perechen meropriiatii po realizatsii federalnoi tselevoi programmy Kompleksnye mery protivodeistviia zloupotrebleniu narkotikami i ikh nezakonnomu oborotu na 20052009 gody. 85. Ibid. 86. Federalnaia tselevaia programma Kompleksnye mery protivodeistviia zloupotrebleniu narkotikami i ikh nezakonnomu oborotu na 20052009 gody; L.V. Gotchina, Organizatsiia antinarkoticheskoi raboty v otsenkakh spetsialistov silovykh struktur (Nekotorye aspekty) (Organization of Anti-Drug Work as Seen by Law Enforcement Specialists [Selected Aspects]), Pravo i obrazovanie 3 (2006): 15051. 87. Raspredelenie assignovanii po gosudarstvennym zakazchikam federal-

32

Problems of Post-Communism

January/February 2009

noi tselevoi programmy Kompleksnye mery protivodeistviia zloupotrebleniu narkotikami i ikh nezakonnomu oborotu na 20052009 gody (Division of Responsibilities Between Governmental Entities in Connection with the Federal Program Titled Comprehensive Measures to Combat Illicit Drug Use and Drug Trafc for 20052009), www.narkotiki.ru/tabs/fcp2005pril4.html. 88. Kramer, Drug Abuse in Russia, p. 13. 89. Elena Omelchenko, You Can Tell by the Way They Talk: Analysing the Language Young People in Russia Use to Talk About Drugs, Journal of Communist Studies and Transition Politics 22, no. 1 (2006): 59. 90. Ibid., pp. 55, 61. 91. Maskas, Trafcking Drugs, p. 156. 92. V.I Starodubov and A.I. Tatarkin, eds., Vliianie narkomanii na sotsialno-ekonomicheskoe razvitie obschestva (Inuence of Drug Addiction on the Socio-Economic Development of Society) (Moscow and Ekaterinburg, 2006), pp. 26667. 93. Tom Partt, Vladimir Mendelevich: Fighting for Drug Substitution Treatment, Lancet 368 (2006): 279. 94. Kramer, Drug Abuse in Russia. 95. Maskas, Trafcking Drugs, p. 155; A. Zuev, Protivodeistvie nezakonnomu oborotu narkotikov v Moskve (Combating Illicit Trafc of Drugs in Moscow), Zakonnost 9 (2004): 43; Vyacheslav N. Kurchenko, Ogranichenie provokatsii ot deistvii pri presechenii prestuplenii (Limiting Provocations in Actions Directed at Crime Suppression), Zakonnost 1 (2004): 12. 96. Zuev, Protivodeistvie nezakonnomu oborotu narkotikov v Moskve, p. 43; N.A. Sartaeva, Narkotism: Sotsialno-Pravovoi aspekt (Narcotization: Socio-Legal Aspects), Gosudarstvo i pravo 2 (2003): 121. 97. Maskas, Trafcking Drugs, p. 176; Kurchenko, Ogranichenie provokatsii ot deistvii pri presechenii prestuplenii, p. 10. For example, drugenforcement ofcers will have user A contact user B and ask for help in obtaining drugs. User A pays user B with money provided by the ofcers. When user B gives user A the drugs, user B is arrested and charged with trafcking. See Mikhail A. Fomin, Provokatsiia sbyta narkoticheskikh sredstv, psikhotropnykh veschestv ili ikh analogov (Provocation of Selling of Drugs, Psychotropic Substances and Their Derivatives), Ugolovnyi protsess 5 (2007): 55. 98. V. Manchinskii, Obedinenie usilii v borbe s narkoprestupnostu (Uniting of Forces in the Struggle Against Drug Crime), Zakonnost 5 (2006): 5; A.G. Kharatishvilli, Pravovye i kriminalisticheskie problemy vyiavleniia kontrabandy narkotikov (Legal and Criminological Problems of Detecting Drug Smuggling), Chernye dyry v rossiiskom zakonodatelstve 3 (2006): 114. 99. H.I. Mussakaev, Organizatsiia raboty prokuratury po nadzoru za ispolneniem zakonov Federalnoi Sluzhboi po Kontrolu za oborotom narkotikov (Organizing the Work of the Prosecution in Supervising How the FSKN Complies with [Anti-Drug] Laws), Chernye dyry v rossiiskom zakonodatelstve 4 (2006): 371. 100. Kurchenko, Novatsii v sudebnoi praktike po delam o nezakonnom oborote narkotikov, p. 6; V. Manchinskii, Obedinenie usilii v borbe s narkoprestupnostu (Uniting of Forces in the Struggle Against Drug Crime), Zakonnost 5 (2006): 4. 101. Maskas, Trafcking Drugs, p. 163; D.V. Ivanov, Preduprezhdenie prestuplenii v sfere oborota narkotikov, soverchaemykh sotrudnikami organiv vnutrennikh del (Preventing Drug Crimes Committed by Law Enforcers), Pravo i politika 6 (2004): 48. 102. Shelley, Drug Trade in Contemporary Russia, 20. 103. E.M. Shcherbakova, The Narcotics Invasion in Russia: What the Statistics Say, Sociological Research 44, no. 5 (2005): 54. 104. Shelley, Drug Trade in Contemporary Russia, p. 20. 105. Shcherbakova, Narcotics Invasion in Russia, p. 54; Blaine Stothard, Olga Romanova, and Larissa Ivanova, Recent Developments in HIV/AIDS Prevention for Russian Adolescents, Sex Education 7, no. 2 (2007): 175. 106. The New Face of an Epidemic, Moscow Times (May 21, 2008). These are the ofcial gures; the real number of people infected with HIV is probably much higher; see Paul Webster, HIV/AIDS Explosion in Russia Triggers Research Boom, Lancet 361 (2003): 2132. 107. New Face of an Epidemic. 108. Federalnaia tselevaia programma Kompleksnye mery protivodeist-

viia zloupotrebleniu narkotikami i ikh nezakonnomu oborotu na 20052009 gody. 109. Stothard, Romanova, and Ivanova, Recent Developments in HIV/ AIDS Prevention, p. 179. 110. Shcherbakova, Narcotics Invasion in Russia, pp. 55, 58. 111. Kramer, Drug Abuse in Russia, p. 19. 112. Cornell and Swanstrom, Eurasian Drug Trade, p. 10; Alexandra Guaqueta, Change and Continuity in U.S.-Colombian Relations and the War Against Drugs, Journal of Drug Issues 1 (2005): 42. 113. For example, the intensication of the war on drugs in the United States resulted in the normalization of many surveillance technologies; see David R. Bewley-Taylor, U.S. Concept Wars, Civil Liberties and the Technologies of Fortication, Crime, Law, and Social Change 43 (2005): 84; Kyle Grayson, Discourse, Identity, and the U.S. War on Drugs, in Critical Reections on Transnational Organized Crime, Money Laundering, and Corruption, ed. M. E. Beare (Toronto: University of Toronto Press: 2003), pp. 14548, 153. 114. Ibid., p. 145. 115. Julian Buchanan and Lee Young, The War on DrugsA War on Drug Users? Drugs: Education, Prevention and Policy 7, no. 4 (2000): 410. 116. Eric D. Lock, Jeffrey M. Timberlake, and Kenneth A. Rasinski, Battle Fatigue: Is Public Support Waning for War-Centered Drug Control Strategies? Crime and Delinquency 48, no. 3 (2002): 382. 117. Ibid., p. 416. 118. William N. Elwood, Declaring War on the Home Front: Metaphor, Presidents, and the War on Drugs, Metaphor and Symbolic Activity 10, no. 2 (1995): 9697. 119. Lawrence D. Bobo and Victor Thompson, Unfair by Design: The War on Drugs, Race, and the Legitimacy of the Criminal Justice System, Social Research 73, no. 2 (2006): 447, 451; R. Shenin and G. Suleimanova, NarkobiznesGlobalnaia problemma XXI veka (Drug BusinessGlobal Problem of the Twenty-rst Century), Mirovaia ekonomika i mezhdunarodnye otnosheniia 6 (2006): 55. 120. Elwood, Declaring War on the Home Front, pp. 104, 107; Buchanan and Young, War on Drugs, p. 410. 121. Buchanan and Young, War on Drugs, p. 411. 122. Lock, Timberlake, and Rasinski, Battle Fatigue, p. 381; Gotchina, Organizatsiia antinarkoticheskoi raboty v otsenkakh spetsialistov silovykh struktur, p. 148; Eva Bertram and Kenneth Sharpe, War Ends, Drugs Win, Nation (January 6, 1997): 12. 123. Catherine Carstairs, The Stages of the International Drug Control System Drug and Alcohol Review 24 (2005): 62. 124. Cherkesov, Glavnoi prichinoi usugubleniia narkoobstanovki stali vneshnie prichiny. 125. Quoted in Bertram and Sharpe, War Ends, Drugs Win, p. 13. 126. Ibid. 127. George W. Bush to the AIDS Foundation of Chicago (fall 2000), www. dogwoodcenter.org/ban/10ban.html. 128. See ibid. The harm caused by licit substances such as alcohol and tobacco is frequently neglected in ofcial pronouncements; see Buchanan and Young, War on Drugs, p. 413. 129. Poznyak et al., Illicit Drug Use and Its Health Consequences, p. 186; Dan Baum, The War on Drugs, 12 Years Later, American Bar Association Journal (March 1993): 71. 130. The text of the convention is available at www.ukcia.org/pollaw/ lawlibrary/conventionagainstillicittrafc1988.html; Cindy S.J. Fazey, The Commission on Narcotic Drugs and the United Nations International Drug Control Programme: Politics, Policies and Prospect for Change, International Journal of Drug Policy 14 (2003): 160. 131. The primary emphasis of the 1988 convention is on law-enforcement measures rather than treatment and rehabilitative measures; see M. Hasan, Problemy mezhdunarodnogo sotrudnichestva po borbe s narkotikami (Problems of International Cooperation in the Struggle Against Drugs), Pravo i politika 8 (2006): 135. 132. Fazey, Commission on Narcotic Drugs and the United Nations

Orlova The Russian War on Drugs

33

International Drug Control Programme, p. 161. 133. C.W. Maris, The Disasters of War: American Repression Versus Dutch Tolerance in Drug Policy, Journal of Drug Issues 29, no. 3 (1999): 498. 134. Nicholas Dorn, UK Policing Drug Trafckers and Users: Policy Implementation in the Context of National Law, European Traditions, International Drug Conventions, and Security After 2001, Journal of Drug Issues 3 (2004): 533. 135. Gotchina, Organizatsiia antinarkoticheskoi raboty v otsenkakh spetsialistov silovykh struktur, p. 148. 136. Kramer, Drug Abuse in Russia, p. 24. 137. Elwood, Declaring War on the Home Front, p. 110. 138. Omelchenko, You Can Tell by the Way They Talk, p. 61; Kramer, Drug Abuse in Russia, p. 16.

139. Zh.T. Seralinov and S.V. Bataev, Problemy mezhdunarodno-pravovogo regulirovaniia borby s nezakonnym oborotom narkotikov (Problems of International Legal Regulation of the Struggle Against Drug Trafcking), Politseiskoe Pravo 4 (2006): 9398. Many other topics were subsumed into the U.S. drug policy in Colombia (e.g., institution building, justice sector reform). See Guaqueta, Change and Continuity in U.S.-Colombian Relations, p. 36. 140. Elwood, Declaring War on the Home Front, p. 101.

To order reprints, call 1-800-352-2210; outside the United States, call 717-632-3535.

34

Problems of Post-Communism

January/February 2009