Cracking down on illicit drug use
(From The Japan Times Nov. 15 issue)

薬物の取締りを強化せよ

    Mr. Kenji Kobayashi, a former Diet member of the Democratic Party of Japan, who ran in vain in the No. 7 constituency in Aichi Prefecture in the Sept. 11 general elections, was indicted together with two aides on a charge of possessing a stimulant drug. Ironically, in his Diet debate in March 2002, he had called on the government to strengthen measures to control smuggling of stimulant drugs and other narcotics.

    Among the SDF members arrested or indicted on suspicion of having possessed or sold marijuana were seven submariners stationed at the Maritime Self-Defense Force's Yokosuka naval base in Kanagawa Prefecture. Submariners represent an elite 5 percent of the 40,000-strong MSDF.

    According to the National Police Agency, about 12,000 people were taken into police custody on charges of violating the Stimulant Drug Control Law in 2004, down 2,400 from the previous year and representing the fourth straight yearly decline. But officials note that Japan is at its third peak of stimulant-drug use in the past 60 years -- following the first peak just after World War II and the second one in the 1980s, when stimulant-drug trafficking by gangsters became rampant.

    In the first half of this year, a total of 7,659 people were taken into police custody on charges of using or selling stimulants, opium, marijuana or other narcotic drugs. Of these, 6,450 were suspected of violating the Stimulant Drug Control Law. Among them were 1,736 people in their 20s and 230 minors.

    Police took into custody 204 people in connection with the use or sale of pill-shaped synthetic narcotics such as MDMA; 78 percent of these people were in their 30s or younger.

    Statistics of the Finance Ministry show that narcotics abuse is spreading without abatement in this country whose public safety environment has long been the target of praise. Serious thought should be given to preventing narcotics use from undermining the nation's social fabric.

    According to the ministry, the amount of smuggled narcotics seized by customs authorities has increased five times in the past 10 years. In 2004, about 1.36 tons of narcotics, excluding pill-type drugs like MDMA, were seized -- up 23 percent from the previous year and topping the one-ton mark for the second year in a row. A total of 429,000 pills were confiscated, for a rise of 11 percent.

    Attention must be paid to the rapid rise in the number of people taken into police custody on charges of using or selling MDMA and marijuana. In 2004, a record 2,600 people were taken into police custody. More than 70 percent of them were in their 20s and 30s, and 90 were first offenders. MDMA and marijuana can be obtained rather easily on city streets, in entertainment clubs or over the Internet. They are cheaper than stimulant drugs; moreover, the sense of guilt from smoking marijuana differs little from that of smoking a cigarette.

    One legal problem is that some narcotic drugs including MBDB, also called Bliss, and 2CT7, also called Zoom, are not covered by the narcotics control law. While the law covers 143 types of drugs, it cannot address drugs whose chemical structure is even slightly different from those defined. Thus many drugs whose effect is the same as that of stimulants and other drugs are freely traded.

    The NPA says there are 160 sales channels for such drugs on the Internet. These drugs are also available at more than 280 locations throughout the country, according to the Health, Welfare and Labor Ministry.

    In April the Tokyo Metropolitan Government enforced a by-law to criminalize the manufacturing and sale of three types of drugs not covered by the law. The Health Ministry plans to include MBDB and 2CT7 under the antinarcotics law and to collect more information on drugs not covered by the law.

    The government must employ every means available to stem the spread and use of narcotics. The most effective means is teaching children about the dreadful damage that narcotics use can cause. A positive step in that direction is the ministry's plans to seek an appropriation of ¥107 million for fiscal 2006 to distribute booklets about such damage to senior and junior high school students, and to send officials abroad to examine narcotics situations there firsthand.

The Japan Times Weekly
Nov. 19, 2005
(C) All rights reserved

    9・11総選挙で落選した小林憲司前民主党衆院議員は2人の元秘書とともに、覚せい剤取締法違反容疑で起訴された。

    また、海上自衛隊横須賀基地では、7人の潜水艦乗組員が大麻取締法違反の罪に問われた。

    警察庁によれば、04年の覚せい剤取締法違反容疑での逮捕者は約1万2000人と、前年比2400人減、4年連続の減少となった。しかし覚せい剤使用はひきつづき、戦後60年間での第3のピーク期にあるという。

    今年前半だけでも、7659人が覚せい剤、アヘン、大麻などの薬物使用、販売容疑で逮捕されている。そのうち6450人は覚せい剤取締法違反容疑で、1736人は20歳代、230人は未成年だった。一方、MDMAなど錠剤型の合成麻薬の使用、販売容疑で逮捕された204人のうち78%は40歳未満だった。

    04年の合成麻薬や大麻の使用、販売容疑での逮捕者は2600人。MDMAおよび大麻は街頭、クラブ、またはネット上で容易に入手できる。覚せい剤よりも安価で、大麻吸引に対する罪悪感は喫煙の場合とほとんど変わらないといわれる。

    さらに、MBDB、2CT7などの麻薬は麻薬取締法の適用外となっている。適用される143の薬物と僅かでも化学構造が異なれば、適用外となる。

    東京都はさる4月、麻薬取締法の適用されない3種類の薬物の製造販売を禁止する条例を施行した。厚労省はMBDB、2CT7に麻薬取締法を適用し、適用外となっている薬物について情報を収集する方針である。

    同省は06年に中高校生に薬物の害に関する小冊子を配布するため1億700万円の予算を計上し、担当者を海外に出張させて薬物事情を調査する方針である。政府は薬物被害の拡大を阻止するため全力を挙げるべきだ。