Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez on Thursday urged lawmakers from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations member- states to join President Rodrigo Duterte’s campaign against illegal drugs as he also reiterated his firm support behind such effort.
Alvarez aired the call in his welcome remarks at the opening of the 13th meeting of the AIPA Fact Finding Committee to Combat the Drug Menace, held at Conrad Hotel in Pasay City. Alvarez is the incumbent president of the Asean Inter-Parliamentary Assembly.
Alvarez said that during the 30th Asean Summit here in the Philippines, President Duterte called on leaders of Asean to unite in addressing the menace of illegal drugs in the region.
“I take this opportunity to urge you to do the same. With political will and cooperation, we will dismantle the massive illegal drug trade apparatus,” Alvarez said.
Alvarez said that drug trafficking remains as a major security concern in the Asean community and that the region has become a major transshipment hub for illegal drugs by transnational organized crime groups to meet the demand of an increasingly growing international market for illegal drugs.
“We cannot ignore the impact of drug use on society—especially to the family and the youth. Financial difficulties are just some of the challenges a family may face. We simply cannot stand idly by as our region succumbs to the debilitating effects of illegal drugs,” Alvarez said.
He noted that the Asean community already made its initial moves to face the problem with the adoption last year of the Asean Work Plan on Securing Communities against Illicit Drugs 2016 to 2025.
“As legislators, we support this vision by introducing measures that could strengthen mechanisms to sop the production, trafficking, and abuse of illicit drugs in our countries,” Alvarez said.
He also urged AIPA member-states to enhance cooperation in the field of law enforcement and the criminal justice system, to raise awareness and educate all sectors of society especially the youth, and engage local communities, schools and the media to support the realization of a drug-free Asean.
AIPA secretary general Isra Sunthornvut, for his part, thanked the Philippines for hosting the meeting and enjoined legislative bodies in the region to combine their efforts to combat the drug menace.
While the delegates to the AIFOCOM meeting came in formal attire, the mood was palpably casual as many were seen greeting each other and engaging in informal discussions before the start of the session.
The session was suspended shortly after the opening remarks of Speaker Alvarez and Sunthornvut to give way for a unity photo before the body convened again to start tackling the agenda for the meeting slated for July 5 to 8, 2017.
During the AIFOCOM meeting, AIPA member-countries exchanged information and presented proposals on how to combat the drug menace in their respective countries and in the Asean region in general.
Lawmakers from Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao PDR, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam individually discussed the drug issue in their respective countries on Wednesday during the 13th AIPA Fact Finding Committee or AIFOCOM to Combat the Drug Menace.
Surigao del Norte Rep. Robert Ace Barbers, House committee on dangerous drugs' chairperson, was appointed AIFOCOM chairman.
In his acceptance speech, Barbers called on his fellow Asean lawmakers to be more decisive and bolder in addressing the drug menace in the region.
Two international organizations specializing on drugs, namely, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and the ASEAN Senior Officials on Drug Matters (ASOD) have also been invited to present their reports to the AIFOCOM.
The UNODC informed the body that in the Asean region, methamphetamine and heroin are still the two major drug threats and there is continuing expansion of the methamphetamine market in Southeast Asia and its neighboring region, East Asia.
The UNODC reported that in recent years, seizures of both forms of methamphetaminetablets and crystalline have reached record highs, with 2017 considered as a record year.
“Both the number and the scale of illicit methamphetamine manufacturing facilities continue to increase to meet the rapidly rising demand for methamphetamine in the region,” the UNODC reported.
“Substantial quantities of precursor chemicals, which can be used for the manufacture of methamphetamine, have been seized in the region with recent trends indicating a diversification of precursors and methods used,” the UNODC said.
The UNODC report further stated that “wide range of new synthetic drugs, often called as new psychoactive substances (NPS), have been identified in East and Southeast Asia in recent years. These include potent synthetic opioids, such as derivatives of fentanyl, which have been implicated in the ongoing opioid overdose crisis in North America.”
Furthermore, the UNODC reported that as opium poppy cultivation continues to take place in the Golden Triangle, opiates remain problematic in the region in terms of production, trafficking and use. Some countries in the region, such as Cambodia, Thailand, and Vietnam, reported consecutive increases in heroin use, it said.
The UNODC revealed that many countries in Southeast Asia are not ready to meet expected challenges from emerging dangerous synthetic drugs.