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Önder Kutlu & Erhan Örselli & Veysel Babahanoğlu
Drug use, possession and trade are prohibited by many countries. However, it is also
a fact that drugs are used in almost all cultures and societies in all periods of history.
The establishment of regulatory and supervisory mechanisms at international level on
the issue of drug use and sale, which have exhibited very different dimensions over a
period of about 150 years, became possible as late as early 20th century.
The word “addiction” is emphasized in defining narcotics. Therefore, addiction emer-
ges as one of the most important concepts in the drug problem. In this context, addi-
ction is defined as “the poisoning state consisting of the substances used as physical
and psychological necessities in increasing proportion, resulting in the formation of
an undesirable state, arising from the interaction of the patient organism, drug and
environment” (Sevil, 1998: 7-11).
The drug problem has taken the form of a crime type defined in national and inter-
national terms as a trans-border problem. The worldwide increase in drug use, the
high profit share in the drug trade, the attempts of terrorist organizations to get more
shares from this profit at the point of providing financial income, and the technological
developments have accelerated drug production and trafficking. A comprehensive
struggle on a global scale with the drug problem has become a necessity. The solu-
tion of the drug problem is the one that can be solved with international cooperation.
Turkey evaluates the fight against the drug problem in this perspective and supports
the efforts to increase cooperation at the regional and global level as well as the nati-
onal level (
).
The policy of our country to combat the drug problem can be dealt with in two diffe-
rent contexts: policies for avoiding the supply of narcotic substances such as traffic-
king, sales and production, and policies for minimizing drugs use, such as treatment,
remediation and prevention. In this context, the framework document is the National
Drugs and Strategy Document, which was put forward for the first time in 2006 in line
with the European Union Strategies for Combating Drugs. The document was then
revised to cover the years 2013-2018 (Pınarcı, 2014: 38-39).
The first organised studies on the drug problem in Turkey began with the Decision of
National Security Council (NSC) dated 26.04.1996 and numbered 393. As a result of
this decision, a recommendation was made to the Council of Ministers for the estab-
lishment of a “Supreme Board for the Suppression of Drug Use” and a “Sub-Commit-
tee on the Struggle against Drug Use” in order to ensure coordination of the activities
to be carried out within the context of the fight against the drug problem. That board
was established under the Board of the Family Research Institution by the Council
of Ministers with the decision dated 25.07.1997 and numbered 97/9700 (
.
kom.pol.tr).
