The Global Commission on Drug Policy – a panel that includes former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria Executive Director Michel Kazatchkine, and several other current and former world leaders – has released a report calling for “the legalization of some types of drugs and an end to the criminalization of drug users,” The Voice of Russia reports (Vladimir, 6/2).

“In its 2011 report, the Global Commission endorses approaching drug use as a public health problem as well as examining alternatives to the incarceration of drug users, farmers, and petty sellers. But it also recommends more revolutionary approaches like decriminalisation of drug use and the possibility of legal regulation,” Inter Press Service writes (Crowe, 6/2).