The legalisation debate broadens

By T.W. | PUERTO VALLARTA

OVER the past six months the debate on drugs has moved into the open, as sitting heads of state have gone on the record for the first time to say that they would be prepared to consider legalising narcotics rather than fruitlessly fight them. One of the strongest advocates of radical reform has been Otto Pérez Molina, who was sworn in as Guatemala's president on January 14th. Mr Pérez, a former head of military intelligence, campaigned promising an “iron fist” against crime. He now suggests that the best way to crush Latin America's drug mafias might be to remove their main source of revenue from the criminal economy by legalising it.

On April 17th Mr Pérez took his message to the World Economic Forum (WEF) on Latin America, which is taking place this week in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. Mr Pérez's experience at the sharp end of the war on drugs makes him particularly convincing when talking about its futility. He told the WEF: “Twenty years ago, I was director of intelligence in Guatemala…We had great successes. A lot of cocaine was captured. Plantations of marijuana were destroyed. Also at that time many drug-trafficking bosses were captured. Twenty years later, I assume the presidency of the country—and I find that the drug-trafficking organisations are bigger.”