Thank you Chair.

This CND’s discussions come at an exceptional time; when fragile progress is being undone with painfully real consequences on the lives of thousands. Last year’s high-level declaration reiterated a commitment by all Member States to “respecting, protecting and promoting all human rights […] in the development and implementation of drug policies”. A year later, we seem further away from achieving this goal.

Harm reduction has been endorsed by the entire UN system – including this forum – as critical to promoting the right to health. Still, major challenges remain. By the end of 2024, harm reduction was endorsed by the national policies of 108 countries in diverse social, political and cultural contexts, and HRI recorded a slight increase in availability of services. At the same time, significant regional differences and gaps in quality persist, while stigma, discrimination and criminalisation act as almost insurmountable barriers to access to services particularly for women, people belonging to racial and ethnic minorities, and other marginalised groups.

The situation is even more severe in prisons, where people who use drugs are overrepresented due to criminalisation but services are almost non-existent, and when available underfunded or difficult to access.

International donor funding is critical for harm reduction in low- and middle-income countries, so the loss of US funding, and threatened cuts to other budgets, risks triggering the most profound crisis of harm reduction ever: lifesaving services have been shut overnight, and lives have already been lost to overdose. Unless the cuts are reversed and donors and governments step up with alternative funding, hard fought gains in HIV and HCV prevention will be lost. The human and economic cost will be unbearable.

Finally, human rights centred drug policies require urgent abolition of the death penalty for drug offences, which as we know contravenes both human rights and drug control standards. Regrettably, HRI’s new Global Overview reports a record 615 drug-related executions in 2024; with hundreds more executions unreported. Most concerningly, almost one in two people executed in 2024 was convicted of a drug offence. In other words, punitive drug policies are THE key driver of the use of capital punishment and a significant barrier to global abolition.

The international community has the opportunity and the responsibility to effect change, and this very forum could and should play a leading role. Regrettably, Vienna remains silent, sending a dangerous message to retentionist countries that executions and other extreme rights violations in the name of drug control can continue with impunity.

These developments are one more clear indication that a comprehensive review of the international drug control framework is urgently needed; with a view to promoting an inevitable paradigm shift towards drug policies that truly promote health and human rights for all. These can be achieved by placing people who use drugs at the centre, by divesting from extreme and ineffective policies such as the death penalty and incarceration, and by investing in harm reduction and other social justice interventions. We have the tools, the resources, and the evidence to make this happen – we just need your political will.

Thank you.