 Hello, good evening. My name is Peter Sjaroszy and I'm the editor of the Drug Reporter website. Welcome to the first episode of our new live online video show, Drug Reporter Coffee, where we will regularly discuss new developments in the world of drug policy with professionals, activists and decision makers. Today, our show will feature drug policy reform in a small country in Southern Eastern Europe, North Macedonia. We will discuss the chances of reform with two guests, two activists from the country. But before we start the discussion, we would like to present you some breaking news on drug policy reform around the world. In a historic vote today, the United Nations has finally recognized the medicinal value of cannabis, reported leading drug policy reform organizations in a press release published this afternoon. After two years of fractious debate, today in Vienna, the UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs, this is the largest drug policy decision-making body in the world voted to remove cannabis from schedule four of the 1961 single conventional narcotic drugs, which is reserved for substances with limited or no therapeutic benefit. So by doing so, the UN finally acknowledges the therapeutic value of cannabis. This is welcome news for the millions of people who use cannabis as a medicine and reflects the reality of a growing market for cannabis-based medicinal products. Although welcoming the removal from schedule four, drug policy experts also expressed serious concerns that cannabis will remain in schedule one of the 1961 convention, maintaining it under the same strict controls as for example, heroin or cocaine. Following the first ever scientific review of cannabis by the Vertusse organization in 2018, some limited rescheduling of cannabis was recommended, but removing it from schedule one was no part of the package despite WHO's own finding that cannabis was less harmful than most other drugs in that schedule goes the press release. Vancouver city council unanimously begged the motion seeking to decriminalize possession of small amounts of illegal drugs in the end of November reports global news. The move comes as the city looks for out-of-the-box solutions to a toxic street drug crisis with a mounting death toll. The vote came the same day, the BC or British Columbia coroner service that reported 162 over those deaths in the province in October, about five per day. Vancouver does not have the power to decriminalize drug possession, but it will instead now seek an exemption from the federal control drugs and substances act. If the plan is approved, Vancouver would be the first jurisdiction in Canada to decriminalize street drugs for personal possession for medicine, for personal possession. Mexican Senate votes to legalize cannabis, but activists criticized the measure, reported the High Times Magazine on November 30. The Mexican Senate approved the landmark cannabis legalization bill last week, bringing the country one step closer to creating the largest legal cannabis market in the world. Under the bill approved by senators last week, adults would be permitted to possess up to 28 grams of cannabis and cultivate a limited number of cannabis plants for personal use. However, some activists, including Julio Salazar, a senior lawyer and legalization advocate for the, with the nonprofit group, Mexico United Against Crime have said that the bill is flawed, favoring large corporations over small businesses and family farms. The measure also does little to strip the cannabis trade from the cartels in Mexico, where more than 100,000 people have been killed in drug-related violence in recent years. Zara Snap, co-founder of the RIA Institute, a Mexico City-based drug policy research and advocacy group believes that the bill will exclude small businesses and currently illicit cultivators from participating in the world's largest legal cannabis market once the law goes into effect. So this was the news on Drug Reporter Cafe. And now let me welcome and introduce our two guests from North Macedonia, with whom we can explore what is happening in the country with regard to drug policy reform. First, I would like to introduce Natasha Boskova from the Coalition Margins, a non-formal joint platform and as the result of a joint effort of several organizations to promote the protection and respect of the fundamental human rights of marginalized communities. Hi, Natasha. Hello. And Vlatko Dekov from HOPS, Healthy Options Projects Copia, one of the leading harm reduction and drug policy organizations in the country. Hi, Vlatko. Okay, hello, Peter. So can we start with you explaining us what is the current legal status of cannabis in your country? Well, cannabis is a controlled substance which cultivation, as in most of the countries in Macedonia as well, cannabis considered a controlled substance which cultivation, production and processing and its selling is regulated by the law on control of opioid drugs and psychotropic substances. What is crucial for the cannabis is that until 2016, it was not explicitly mentioned in this law, but only in this list which you already mentioned as part of the conventions which were introduced in the national legislation in North Macedonia. In 2016, there was the first amendment to the law that introduced cannabis as a controlled substance and where the criteria for its cultivation, production and production of cannabis products was regulated. So this was based on several years of advocacy by the NGOs, mostly NGOs coming from different patients' rights organizations which represented people with different health condition, but also organizations such as HOPS and coalition organizations that are dealing with drug policy were also interested about the legalization of cannabis for medical use. So it's controlled under certain circumstances legal entities can cultivate and produce cannabis products otherwise it's considered as possession and use of cannabis is considered a crime. Do you think that this current decision of the UN will have any impact on the legislation of cannabis in your country? Yes, definitely. You are aware that there is an ongoing discussion about even legalization for recreational use of cannabis. So I believe that this decision today will affect in the improvement of the current law on drug control where there is a very limited access to the medicine, cannabis products as medicine. So I believe that this decision will improve this part of the regulation but also will affect the regulation of use of cannabis for recreational use as well. So you mentioned that North Macedonia allowed legal access to medicinal cannabis in 2016. Can you please tell us like what preceded this decision? Like what worked in advocacy in your country? Like did you show stories of patients to the public, the media or did you have any like consultation with your government? So maybe for those activists who work on similar issues in other countries that would be interesting like what are your experiences? What works in advocacy in this territory? Well, COPS Specialism Organization which more than 20 years is working in the field of drug policy and coalition joined a little bit later but still we are both organization advocating for generally the criminalization of drugs and legalization of cannabis. So at this point in 2016, actually at that time the government was closed for intervention by the NGOs although we publicly claimed for the criminalization and legalization of cannabis but still did not have access to institutions to negotiate to argue with the decision makers. So jointly with other organization for patients rights with different health conditions we use the public space, the media to claim for a legalization of cannabis for medical use. But I must say that that was one way communication while the government, the Ministry of Health they had some internal discussion about the amendment of the law on narcotic drugs and psychotropic control of narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances. And there were some few public debate where most of the experts and NGO were excluded. So we found out about the actually the amendments of the law when it came to the parliament in January 2016. And at that time it was too late to intervene in the process but however, we used all resources that we had at the time and we lobbied with one MP from the Green Party that was already in the parliament to submit amendments to the suggested law in order to improve the text of the law. For our lucky, she agreed with our claims and she proposed the amendments but unfortunately the amendments were not supported not even by the opposition and the position at that time. So that's why we have a law that is although we can say that there is a legalization for medical use in Macedonia, legalization of cannabis for medical use but still not many patients can access the law. The law has very flaws that should be improved with amendments that should happen in future. Vlatko, I know that you were also present. I would like to add something for this, yeah. Yeah, thank you, Peter. So in that time, I mean before legalization of medical cannabis, there was one organization calling Green Alternative and this organization organized several events about medical cannabis here and even invite the famous guy, Eric Simpson, who also participate in this event. But anyhow, the legalization of cannabis for medical use, it was very surprised for us because it's happened in a very short time and there is no doubt that economic reasons was the major aim of legalization of medical cannabis. And as Natria say, this law doesn't allow, let's say to make money from the company which is already registered in the country. Why? Because company cannot sell their products in abroad. They can sell only in Macedonia and Macedonia is very small market. So because of that, the current government propose changes in the law and want to allow export of raw cannabis and products. It would make sense, right? Because if there are economic incentives behind this reforms, then export would bring much more profit like North Macedonia probably with a small market for this products in itself, right? Yeah. So where would North Macedonia export medicinal cannabis? As I know, Europe is the major aim of the companies. So there is interest from Germany and other countries. So, but both of us and Natria and me, we are not coming from this, you know, companies and... Business sector. Business sector, so this issue is not very familiar for us. So, but for sure, we know that the most of the company prepare their self for selling in Europe, even probably in other continents. Okay, so, but from the perspective of advocates and activists who are fighting for the rights of marginalized people and patients, what do you think is the current regulation of medicinal cannabis appropriate for the clients, for the patients? So do they have safe and good quality access to medicinal cannabis products? Well, one of our key remarks on the amendments in 2016 were that the list of health conditions for which the cannabis can be prescribed is very limited. So oncological diseases, HIV, and epileptic symptoms in children. So these were the conditions where, and these conditions are stipulated in the law. So when we suggested the amendments to the law, we said that this list should not be exhaustive. It should be extended to many more health conditions, but also lists that should be put in the bylaw, not to be strictly put in the law. And every extension of this list should, that means that every time the list is amended, the law should be changed. So it would be much easier if it's based on the decision of the health minister of health or bylaw that can be changed easily. So one of the remarks of our of the law was that this list should be extended. There was also limitation that only few specialists, doctor can prescribe the medicine and only doctors which are working in the public health institution, not the private clinic. So, and as Vladko said, the limitation of the law that is only focused on the domestic market leads to high prices for a very small amount of products which are not very, with good quality and with price that people cannot afford. And following the adoption of the law, we made research among the patients and our findings says that beside the legalization of cannabis for medical use in Macedonia, people continue to buy it on the black market or to prepare it for themselves and expose them to criminal liability since the possession of a certain amount of cannabis can be charged with criminal sanction. So the conclusion is that the current law does not gives the aim or gives the result that was the aim of the decision makers at the beginning. So if we speak about recreational cannabis users who buy from the black markets, what is the, what happens then if the police calls them, if they are arrested by the police, what are the sanctions and what is the practice of law enforcement? Based on the criminal code, possession for personal use is not provided as is not considered a crime, but very well established practice by the police, by the prosecution office and courts for many years. Actually, we face with the fact of criminalization of possession of any substance including possession of cannabis. So people who are caught with small amount of cannabis can face criminal charge and possibly alternative measure, but if the amount is bigger then these people can face also jail, can face prison sentence. So that beside the advocating for legalization for medical use, we also advocate for the fact of the criminalization, legal and the fact of the criminalization for possession of cannabis. So, yeah, Blatko, please, yeah. I think it's very interesting to say that cannabis in Macedonia is traditionally cultivated in almost all regions in the country, but also for recreational use. We know that in scoping in 30s, some people use hashish, but the real boom of recreational use started in late of 70s and beginning of 80s. So there is some places in the country, even villages like villages Dobreici, which is very famous about this cannabis culture where majority of the people are user or are friendly for cannabis use. Let's say in 80s, in some coffee shops in Amsterdam, there was cannabis with name of these villages ago. There was a news published in all media under the name Stromica, which is the guy from the city of Stromica, tell the police that somebody's still from his cannabis plants. So that example shows us that people like this guy think that cannabis is something which naturally belong to him. So he don't fear from police. He going to police and inform police that somebody's still from his cannabis plants. So I'd like to stress that there is some kind of the traditional use. There is some part of the culture of the people who live in the country. So that also includes the police, that they are not so much prioritized on cannabis? I'm not sure exactly is the opposite, particularly in the last two years. So there is plenty of news, if you openly say the police information every day because police built them. So you can see that how many people are charged or arrested for possession of cannabis? So this is happen after legalization of medical cannabis, the number of people who are arrest for cannabis possession is much higher. Is there any other drugs in the country? Wow, but is there a causal relationship between the two? So that was the cause of the increase that medicinal cannabis was legalized? Yes, I think that there was a connection between these two activities of the government. So at the end of 2015, before the adoption of the amendments of the law where the cannabis was legalized for medical use, there was a very frequent cases of charging people for planting, for having one or two plants at their home. So this was somehow an announcement of this medicalization process. And since then we face every day with police reports where people are caught with small amount of plant. So I see some contrast in this because now the current prime minister of Macedonia just announced that the government wants to legalize recreational cannabis as well. And as far as I know, that was not his first statement on this topic. So can you explain then what is behind this? Like if you have a very repressive law enforcement policy against cannabis users and at the same time, it seems that at the highest level, the government already decided to legalize cannabis, right? Yes, actually this was his first statement about legalization of cannabis. Several times before, prime minister mentioned only decriminalization. So, but in his last interview, prime minister say that he support options, option of legalization of cannabis for recreational use in cafes, in other hospitality places, in capital city scope, but also in other tourist places in country. Also he added that the government investigated Amsterdam and Netherlands as possible model for legalization. And actually answer of your question is another his statement where he stressed that legalization of cannabis was a part of the government's planet package of measure for stimulating the economy, particularly after the COVID and health crisis. So no doubt that first reason for legalization in country is economic. But we as NGOs and as activists, we are going to raise other issue, which is also relevant, even much more relevant for us. And they are the health and well-being of cannabis and human rights. So people should not go into jail for growing of plants for personal use or possession of cannabis for personal use. So actually we recognize the possibilities to influence among the government within this issue. So we are part of the initiative calling operation... Liberation. Sorry? Liberation. Liberation or relief. I don't know how to translate. So until now this initiative is supported by 20-round NGOs, hundreds of public figures, like intellectuals, university professors, artists, musicians, politicians and numerous of cafes and music clubs. They support these initiatives. And the major requests of initiatives are decriminalization of possession and personal use of cannabis, decriminalization of growing plants for personal use, also to low to setting up of social clubs, cannabis social clubs, similar like, let's say, in Spain or something like that. Also, I think another very important issue is to establishing a special fund from taxes, which company who produce and trade with cannabis will pay and to specify exact percentage of this fund, which will be used for programs for marginalized groups and treatment of different medical conditions. And the last one is to increase the number, I think the nutshell already spoke, it's an increase of number of health conditions for prescribing medical cannabis because currently cannabis is allowed only for disease and also to allowing doctors from both health sectors, public and private to prescribe cannabis. So this is the request of our initiative and we hope that the government will invite to speak very close with them about our request. It's really nice to hear that now you have quite vibrant and strong and influential civil society done in North Macedonia, especially, you know, a few years ago you had a very similar situation like we had in Hungary with a government that scapegoats and GOs and accuses them of being Shorosh agents and that guy is actually now our only legal refugee in Hungary. So, how do you see that? Is the government really listen to this coalition of civil society organizations? Because I see that there are also some businessmen and companies coming from America, for example. I read an article that the businessman called Michael Stromatis who goes by Big Mike met with the country's prime minister. So it seems that there are some lobbying efforts from big companies and business enterprises. So how do you see the chances that the government will listen to you and it will not put forward the business interest? Personally, I think that government will make some kind of agreement with us and with business sectors. Yes, it's true there is some people from USA who invest money in the country for they produce cannabis, but really I don't know what kind of the relationships they have with the government. Probably they push the government for these new planning changes of the law to be allowed for them to export cannabis outside of the country. So, okay, for us, this is good, but our issue is to put effort and to decriminalize cannabis and to open for personal use. And as I said before, it's very important to allow to people who use cannabis not to go to jail for any possession of cannabis for personal use. So that is our crucial aim. Natasha. Yes, if I may add, in the last month beside the prime minister, we had the minister of health, the minister of justice on the conference that we had two weeks ago. And they also explicitly said that they are willing to sit and discuss the possibility of decriminalization of possession of any kind of drug, including cannabis. And they supported the statement of the prime minister for legalization. So I think that this is a good start to open the discussion and see where we stand and which arguments are more good to be accepted by the government. But we should not forget the aspect of the Ministry of Interior, which continues to arrest people for possession even of small amount of cannabis. So we see that there is not comprehensive stance even within the government. So we should have this in mind that we should have all relevant institutions or relevant ministries on the table when we discuss decriminalization and legalization. But what we have for now is a good start that we have interest from the highest position to sit and discuss possible ways of legalization. I'm glad you mentioned this conference and the statement of the house minister because we prepared a short video from this conference. So now we can watch it together. Please allow me to say that personally I support decriminalization. And above all, I think that a policy can be successfully implemented as long as the process of applying the violation of that policy was inclusive and included absolutely all the officials on which it is carried out. And it is not resistant to the implementation because even the ideal solution if it is not implemented, it is only partially good. There is no need to apply it from the effect. In addition, we need to look at how to change the treatment in order to find a drug for personal use and determine what is the personal use and what is the criminal part. And that is to be quite clear so that there is no different type of treatment that would repeat the meaning of criminalization even if it was decriminalized. Please allow me to say that the law should determine what amount of psychoactive substance is necessary for personal use through a certain legal solution. In this sense, it should be followed by the education of the organ of the trial and the help in the form of legal and medical advice for the survivors. And on the average, a long-term policy without any doubt leads to a reduction in the use of psychoactive substances without the use of the trial users. But it is also a responsible help for them when it is estimated that it is necessary. It is not like the attitude of a politician but the process of supporting the non-governmental sector. We need to divide these stereotypes and talk about it so that every person is the same. We need to talk about the concept of a community for everyone so that I can give myself a chance to see who is responsible for the process. Please allow me. So this was the short video excerpt from the conference. Yeah, I think it looks amazing and kind of... Can we say that it's a historic statement from your Minister of Health that it is in support of decriminalizing drug use? What are the next steps now? What is the timeline? Because I suppose you will just kind of follow up with the decision or make accountable these officials with their statements. Let me firstly just to explain a little bit about the conference, which I think is interesting. It was two weeks ago and in this conference some of speakers except our Ministers of Health, Minister of Justice and Minister of Social Policy were Portugal Drug Coordinator, Dr. João Aguilal, one of the architects of Portugal Drug Policy Model. Also, Thomas Branski, University Professor from Czech Republic who speaks about the decriminalization in Czech Republic, representative from Ministry of Justice from Netherlands who speak about the cannabis policy in Netherlands and representative of police from Frankfurt who explain about the Frankfurt Way Model who is also a model of decriminalization. And also we have speakers from community representatives from our country and other experts, let's say public prosecutor, representative of Office of Public Prosecutor. She also was a very strong statement about decriminalization of all drugs for possession of drugs for personal use. Also, I present the new publication, it is a comparative study calling Decriminalization of Drugs as a basis for human and effective drug policy. It is analysis of Portuguese and Dutch models for decriminalization. And actually idea for this conference was to share different model of decriminalization of all drugs as a starting point of discussion with this government because we, before we have other conferences, other events when we discuss with this similar issue. So really it was very nice to listen that our ministers support decriminalization. Even some of them like minister of justice share very concrete idea for clear difference of possession of drugs for personal use from possession of drugs for saying, let's say. So for our point of view, it was a successful conference and what is the next steps? So one of the, some of the conclusion of the conference which is our request to the government, the next one. So we are going to discuss with the government concretely, concrete amendments. So this is the amendments to the criminal code that will clearly make differentiation of possession of drugs and other psychotropic substances for personal use and will prevent the punishment of people who use drugs. In meantime, we urge the ministry of interior public prosecutor office and courts to consistently respect the current criminal code and the provision of criminal code that do not prohibit possession of drugs for personal use. Also, we want to start up some process of wider consultation to reform of the national drug policy with the government and to evolve in this process, competent institutions, experts, associations, representative of the people who use drugs. And we hope that this will result in changes to the law policies, but even in the practice because we speak already that the practice currently the practice is the major problem regarding the possession of drugs for personal use. So this process should be based of national research, scientific evidence and best practice in the world. So it doesn't mean that we should copy some model but we should create the model which is more appropriate for our country. And of course, we would like also to raise the question which we already raised. This is the question about to establish the appropriate structure to manage the national drug policy because till now this structure almost doesn't exist. There is the National Interministeral Committee but this committee doesn't work well. So this is some of our idea for the next steps after the conference. You're right, so refreshing to listen to you guys because in our region it's quite unusual now that you hear good news from countries because in most countries there is stagnation or even some pushback in drug policy. So it's really amazing to hear that the decision maker seems to be much more open than in most other countries. What about the public opinion? Do you have any polls that show what the people think about this reform? No, there is no polls for this issue. We made the last one, it was six, seven years ago but it was in completely different context. So and the result was not very positive, only 15% of the percentage of the population. And I must say that this was very representative research doing by all standards. So only 15% percentage of the citizen of Macedonia was in favor of the criminalization. But now probably the results will be much, much more positive for this issue. Natasha, when you speak to people and to professionals or police because I suppose you speak with a lot of different kinds of people, how do you see that are there any positive changes? Yes, beside these activities on advocating for policy changes, we also provide trainings to police officers on treatment of marginalized communities including treatment of people who use drugs. And I must say that at the beginning of the training, it's a two-day training official program of the Center for Training of Police Officers. So at the beginning of the training, they are very not supportive to the people who use drugs. They consider that it's a crime that should be prosecuted as they do. But when we start analyzing the results of their work, like they are working so many hours, they spend so many resources and at the end of the day, they catch for example, two grams of cannabis. They see the nonsense of the existence policy and practice of the police. So at the end, we all conclude that the current policy and practice of the police is not giving the results. It's not the real war on drugs. So we need a different approach and that's what we heard on the conference as well. We had the police officers there and he not explicitly, but he was also in favor of some kind of reform because the current practice does not provide the expected results. And I believe that as I mentioned previously that these strong statements on the highest political level is an excellent start to negotiate a good model. As I mentioned, we cannot copy paste models from Netherlands or Portugal or wherever, but we should take into consideration the local context and see what's applicable here for us, for other people and use the ongoing process of amendment of the criminal code and propose changes of the provision that actually criminalizes possession for personal use. Well, there are many processes opened. The current COVID situation slows down the processes a bit, but we will do our best to use the momentum and have the best possible result. We got a question from one of the people who are watching us online. And I think that's a very relevant question. Like have you heard about EU reactions from the European Union? So are there any kind of comments from European Union officials or do you have any idea how it will affect the relationship between Macedonia, North Macedonia and the EU? On this matter specifically, I haven't heard any comment or I read the official results that are coming from the EU commission on the progress of North Macedonia. That was the question, but I haven't read any official comment or statement related to drug policy to Macedonia and to the current developments on the drug policy that was the question. So North Macedonia just clarify that North Macedonia now is a candidate country, right? So that's the status of the country. Yes. And it is now in the discussions or negotiations of... Yes. If these laws go into a procedure as that they will be evaluated whether it is laws means alignment of this law with the EU law. So probably when the process of adoption will start, then the law will be evaluated from this aspect as well. So it will be definitely very interesting situation that one country which enters the EU will have the most progressive cannabis policy if this law will... We'll see on the first and on the second. Yeah. Okay, Natasha and Blatko, thank you so much for being with us today and explain us what is happening in North Macedonia. We will follow up the events in your country. And I hope that our next discussion will be about celebrating the adoption of decriminalization and dark policy reform laws. So thank you very much for being with us. Thank you for having us. And thank you for those who were watching us online or who are watching now with us. And please follow us on Facebook and Twitter and support Dragreporter. So thank you very much and goodbye.