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Canada: Vancouver Authorities Downplay Rights Abuses
(New York, June 23, 2003) — The city of Vancouver’s attempt to discredit Human Rights Watch only highlights the city’s failure to address concerns about an anti-drug crackdown in its Downtown Eastside, Human Rights Watch said today.


Related Material

HRW's letter to Mayor Larry Campbell
June 23, 2003

Abusing the User: Police Misconduct, Harm Reduction and HIV/AIDS in Vancouver
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Abusing the User: Police Misconduct, Harm Reduction and HIV/AIDS in Vancouver
HRW Report, May 2003



“The mayor has chosen to shoot the messenger, rather than act on the message. His desperate public relations effort makes us more concerned than ever about the rights of vulnerable people in the Downtown Eastside.”

Kenneth Roth
Executive Director
Human Rights Watch


 
Human Rights Watch’s May 2003 report, “Abusing the User,” presented first-hand accounts from numerous Downtown Eastside residents, health service providers, city officials and researchers suggesting widespread police misconduct early in the crackdown on drug traffickers beginning April 7. The report documented violations of the due process rights of injection drug users and actions that impeded their access to life-saving HIV prevention services. The mayor issued a 29-page open rebuttal to the report on June 10.

“The mayor has chosen to shoot the messenger, rather than act on the message,” said Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch. “His desperate public relations effort makes us more concerned than ever about the rights of vulnerable people in the Downtown Eastside.”

In an open letter to the mayor, Roth responded to a series of claims that he characterized as “willfully misleading.” The mayor claimed the Human Rights Watch report was based on “hearsay,” discounting the detailed, first-hand accounts on which the report was based. He also downplayed concerns that the crackdown was driving drug users out of reach of health services, relying instead on an incomplete evaluation of the crackdown’s impact.

Human Rights Watch reiterated its call for genuinely independent oversight of the Vancouver Police Department and protection of needle exchange and other harm reduction services for injection drug users. Human Rights Watch echoed the concern expressed by many health service providers and some city officials that intensifying police action in the fight against illicit drugs should be preceded or accompanied by intensification of treatment and harm reduction services, a principle inherent in the city’s “four pillar” strategy.

Background

On May 8, Human Rights Watch issued a report documenting police misconduct and other human rights violations in connection with an anti-drug crackdown on the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver, Canada. The poorest neighborhood in Canada and home to an estimated 5000 injection drug users, the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver suffers from what may be the worst epidemic of HIV/AIDS in the developed world. The city and the province have for some time invested in needle exchange, methadone maintenance therapy, and other harm reduction-based services to injection drug users in the Downtown Eastside. In November 2002, Vancouver elected a mayor, Larry Campbell, who ran on a platform of addressing injection drug use and HIV/AIDS with “four pillars” of treatment, prevention, harm reduction, and law enforcement.

Shortly into the mayor’s term, the Vancouver police department tripled its presence on the Downtown Eastside and launched a crackdown that some health experts feared would contribute to a new wave of HIV transmission in the city. Human Rights Watch documented first-hand accounts of police violating the due process rights of injection drug users through excessive use of force, illegal search and seizure, and harassment through the use of petty offenses. Human Rights Watch also documented the negative health impact of the crackdown, including interference with needle exchange programs, increased risk of drug overdose, and interruption of primary health services. Our report recommended that the city of Vancouver ensure an independent investigation of all allegations of police misconduct and take steps to mitigate the health impact of the police crackdown.