Guatemala.  The delegations talks about drug-trafficking abiding by international commitments in spite of shortage of resources, and how neither drug production nor consumption have decreased.  Human rights, public health, education deserve more international effort and more cooperation because no country can be successful on its own, although the OAS has recognised that Guatemala is a leader in this effort.  Emphasis must be placed on repairing damage to social fabric caused by drug trafficking.  UNGASS is a critical opportunity to impact collective consciousness of humankind.  Do not limit ourselves to reiterating what was said in the past.  An open and multisectoral dialogue must be promoted, including civil society and indigenous communities.  It’s necessary to engage in the most inclusive possible preparatory process for UNGASS reflecting new priorities.  Workshops should be replaced by 5 broadly attended roundtable discussions.

Uruguay.  Uruguay has launched a strictly regulated market for cannabis. The country regulates access to cannabis through a very precisely defined intervention of the state throughout the process of production and acquiring, etc.  Specific licenses and permissions are required.  Cannabis must be acquired by any individual wanting to participate in these activities.  Regulating access cannot be interpreted as liberalisation of the entire supply chain.

Cuba. A broad, profound and inclusive debate important are the challenges of world drug problem.  Our approach should be in line with three drug conventions.  The country emphasizes the decisive role of the CND in preparatory process, as well as the role of the committee that we decided to set up yesterday. 

South Africa.  The legalisation processes are hampering efforts to deal with the world drug problem.  The delegation fully supports the Chair proposals, in particular the high level workshops. 

Switzerland.  Concerning the titles of the workshops the delegation thinks that it is not appropriate to assign demand and supply reduction.  The General Assembly should have more global approach.  The issue of the controlled substances for medical purposes should not be addressed from perspective of reducing demand or supply, but as a matter of increasing supply so it matches demand coming from people who need these substances for medical purposes. Also, alternative development is not supply reduction.  This is not viable when is put together under supply reduction. Development challenges must be handled more broadly without making specific references to supply reduction.  We propose that we take the same general approach to drugs and health and drugs and crime.  The subtopics have been deleted from decision.  Our assumption is that an interactive discussion will enable us to have a deep going discussion on content and format that we wish to give to the various workshops.

Mexico. We are not in a position to approve proposal of workshops that could be held in the framework of UNGASS because the discussion has not been concluded.  We need to have first a substantive discussion about how it should be organised.  Then there other items to consider ahead the meeting in March, not the other way around.  To proceed with approving this draft agenda would be possible if we exclude the item 4.  Otherwise, first we need to have a discussion about format of the discussion. 

Netherlands.  Subtopics have disappeared.  Netherlands attaches great importance to access to the issue on access to essential medicines.  The country would like to see in text and dedicate a separate workshop to this issue.  Also, we are not interested in how we call it but we need to follow the practice of the General Assembly in the way they open the sessions to everyone who is interested and supported by a country, so civil society can actively participate.

Costa Rica.  The agenda should reflect existence of new realities and trends in world drug problem and participation of civil society in debates of commission and General Assembly on issue of drugs.  A topic is proposed for the issue of production and trafficking of NPS.  A source of great concern for Costa Rica. We would prefer roundtables rather than workshops.  Also, the cross cutting segments should not be isolated. We need to address the vulnerability of those who consume drugs a product of social practices.  Human Rights is a strategic component in tackling both demand and supply reduction, so should not be isolated from the rest of the discussion.  Each roundtable should contain a HR component and the specific needs of vulnerable groups.

Colombia. Working groups, workshops, or roundtables, or panels… are all possible formats but there needs to be much more compressive discussion before we make a discussion: we need to define relevant topics for these segments and to arrive at the right definitions and the right format.  We should start listening to the views existing in the room on these very important issues, what should be included and what should be excluded.  We need to refer to Russian Federation — assets a very relevant issue.  Colombia proposed other segments regarding the current reality and the emerging challenges in world drug problem as a separate segment that would provide an opportunity to see what is changing and what is in store for us in the years to come.  We should include drug traffickers as affected populations.  We understand that the discussion has started.  This is a positive fact, but it cannot be included here today, particularly as regards to the definition of segments.

Brazil. The delegation proposes the “Alternative Development” rather than “sustainable development.” For the 4 item in the agenda.

Norway. L/18.  If international organisations, scientific community, and civil society are represented at workshops or at roundtables these discussions will be truly inclusive and interactive.  We welcome chairs from the civil society and the scientific community.  We welcome suggestion on separate workshop on availability of controlled essential medicines. The headings of workshops should be crisp and short. This also has to do with outreach. The workshop one, “Drugs and Health:  Prevention, treatment and care are issues” should not be limited to HIV/AIDS.  Other issues such as hepatitis, mental health, and overdose deaths need to be included.
The Workshop 2 should be Drugs and crime.  The 3 could be called drugs and human rights.  Human rights have to be part of all issues and discussed in all the workshops including drugs and crime and prison settings.  Regarding workshop 4, development is not sustainable if it is not conducted in a holistic manner in broad context.  Women, communities and gender must be included in all workshops as a crosscutting issue.

Ecuador.  The delegation echoes Brazil and Colombia.  Including a fifth workshop on new approaches to resolve the world drug problem would be interesting, and it is, for Ecuador, a central topic that must be included as a specially defined issue.  A second comment is related with what Mexico said. We should not say drugs and development, when we talk about this issue we should say alternative, preventive development rather than sustainable development.

United States.The delegation likes the format and the framework and would like to ask the secretariat to provide examples of frameworks of panels or workshops that have been used in recent special sessions so that we will have an opportunity to discuss which direction we want to go.  Finally, it is very important to have a starting point agreed to at this meeting so we can bring technical experts in March to have further discussions and help define outcomes and topics that will be agreed to at the Special Session.  It’s very important to have a framework as we leave today.

UK. The delegation aligns with Switzerland and The Netherlands and it is very concerned with the removal of subtopics.  A substantial discussion of access to controlled essential medicines needs to be prioritized in the workshop 1. In the workshop 2, we need to prioritize NPS.  In regards to the naming, we need to ensure that the modalities of debate fit open ended discussion and are clear on what we all want to achieve.  Want to see previous examples of different formats.

Afghanistan.  Supports the inclusion of the Agenda item 4 but it needs further discussion.

Iran. The Non-paper is base for discussion but we weren’t ready to discuss on that. 

Guatemala.
Any decision must be postponed to a later date. On the Item 4 “format of workshops” we think that they should be roundtables. We support Colombia.  We have another roundtable on new realities and trends in the area of world drug problem.  

Pakistan. The threats are deviations, including legalization, or controversial concepts such as harm reduction.  They are not challenges, but threats.  Demands and supply reduction are very important.  A simplify workshop by saying drugs and health and drugs and crime is needed.  Demand reduction also has to do with law enforcement, and a separate element of money laundering and promoting judicial cooperation could be included.  For the workshop 2, the part 3 should form only basis for discussion.  Also for the workshop 3 on human rights should not go beyond de Political Declaration of 2009.  If there is some discussion on workshop 4, then we are taking that with a lot of interest but we would suggest that they remain within confines of Political Declaration of 2009.  We are not here to build up any new declaration, but to assess how much success we have achieved within 2009 Plan of Action and what further needs to be done.  The expertise only lies with governmental experts, which would form the basis of the 2016 outcome document.

Morocco. Full support of proposal regarding provisional agenda.  As for 4th workshop, the delegation endorses the Brazil proposal around replacing sustainable by alternative development. 

China. Agree with Pakistan and Iran. 

Algeria. Agree with Pakistan, Iran and China.

Egypt. The problem of drugs undermines international economy.  Has taken a heavy toll and has many challenges for international agencies and national authorities.  This problem affects all societies and all its evils, it overwhelms all countries.  Therefore, there is an urgent need for us to raise the profile of international frameworks and open new horizons for this international cooperation.  In this way we will be able to fight its adverse effects.  We need to harmonize our viewpoint in this regard so we can protect humans from this imminent danger.  Especially to protect, and provide access to pharmaceuticals to alleviate pain and suffering.  We should all cooperate based on that approach. 

Spain.  Not in favor of restricting this debate.  We have not yet reached agreement on many things.  We should not avoid technical issues such as NPS or new approaches in the political sense.  We must be up-to-date and meet the challenges of our time.  It’s good to promote an inclusive process but we are also aware of the difficulties that still need to be resolved.  We have to reach an agreement and to understand that this draft provisional agenda is something that is for UNGASS 2016.  We do have time until then, but very little until March.  What is the deadline for agreeing on the agenda?  We will need time to translate it and to disseminate it.

South Africa.Align ourselves with China, Iran, Pakistan, and Egypt on confining the discussions to the Political Declaration of 2009 and to the three drug conventions and nothing beyond that. We totally disagree with so-called “new approaches” workshop.  For us this is not useful at all.  The decision has to be redrafted. We wish that all delegations can adopt this decision in order to continue with preparations for UNGASS.

Turkey. Concerning the modalities of the debate during UNGASS, member states make statements in line with national perspectives and we are not having a real exchange of views.  Topics should be general as in its current format.  Each state can use constructive ambiguity. We need to discuss new challenges such as NPS.

Bolivia.  It is important to talk about new realities.  Not only about the participation in roundtables but about the list of topics to be discussed. We would like to subscribe to this new workshop.  Eliminating topics would be a bad precedent.  We firmly support a fifth workshop on new realities.

Secretariat.  The rules of procedure of General Assemble do not refer to roundtables or workshop.  If we refer to them are interchangeable.  Concerning the defining of the modalities, member states will do in the time ahead.

Chair. Concerning the shape of the workshops.  I personally prefer pyramids.  In addition to the agenda for UNGASS 2016, we need to deal with the High Level Segment in 2015.  We need some form of understanding on March 2015.  Also we need time for further elaboration on exact title. So we need to have an agreement on how we structure the discussion in March.  Having said that and having heard the various questions, the Chair proposes consideration of L18 with following amendment to para 4.  It would read as follows: “Interactive discussions on high level segments to be held during Special Session of General Assembly on the World Drug Problem in 2016.  

Then points 5, 6 and 7 of the agenda are approved. 

Mexico. The delegation asks the secretariat to provide precedent of workshops and modalities for workshops please present.

Agenda item 12.  The 58th CND session and the High Level Segment will be held from 9-17 March: some informal meetings will be held on 12th March in parallel to plenary. 

Agenda item 15. Organization of work: adopted.  Administrative and budgetary question.

• Amb. of Thailand elected as chair of 58th CND session. 
• Amb.. of Guatemala  GRULAC
• Amb.. of Netherlands EU