GENEVA - In a report to the Human Rights Council in Geneva on Monday, a top independent rights expert has called for an end to the so-called war on drugs – after describing it instead as a war on people.

Tlaleng Mofokeng, Special Rapporteur to health, insisted that punitive approaches to drug use and drug control affected society’s most vulnerable people.

Ms. Mofokeng said that the lack of a human-rights based approach to addressing drug use has particularly harmed those facing homelessness, poverty and mental health problems, along with other marginalized individuals including sex workers, women, children, LGBT persons, Black and indigenous peoples.

The rights expert insisted that the criminalization of drug use was the single most extreme option within a raft of other regulatory options available to governments.

Meanwhile the lack of access to harm reduction services for drug users in prisons “lead to a high prevalence of HIV, hepatitis C and tuberculosis”, she said.

Full decriminalisation call

In support of the “full decriminalisation” of drug use, the rights expert insisted that evidence from authorities that took this approach “demonstrates that adopting less punitive policies does not result in an increase in drug use, drug-related harms or other crimes.

Special Rapporteurs and other UN Human Rights Council-appointed rights experts are independent of any government, receive no salary for their work and serve in their individual capacity.