Latin American leaders have said recently that the West's 'war on drugs' has failed, and a new book from the IISS agrees. At the launch of Drugs, insecurity and failed states: The problems of prohibition on 14 April, IISS expert and former MI6 deputy director Nigel Inkster said a new approach was needed in which drugs were treated as an issue to be managed rather than as a problem to be solved. Co-author Virginia Comolli pointed out that since the 'war on drugs' began in 1961 with the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs to deter trafficking and possession, none of the international treaty's objectives had been achieved. Worse, both authors said, enforcing the ban on drugs had fuelled violence and instability in the developing world, through the creation of a global black market dominated by powerful criminal groups. In some countries there had been 'state capture', or subversion of institutions, by criminal networks. Other nations, where drugs now overshadowed legitimate businesses, were surviving on 'junkie economies'.
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