The Fourth Meeting of State Commission Supporting Suppression of Distributing New Psychoactive Substances was held at the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Georgia. The Commission is composed of the representatives from Ministry of Internal Affairs, Ministry of Labour, Health and Social Affairs and Ministry of Finance of Georgia. The Commission meets every month and conducts permanent monitoring over the challenges related to new psychoactive substances in Georgia, as well as over the implementation of relevant legislation.
At the Meeting the agencies, within the scope of their competences, presented the information on fight against illicit traffic in new psychoactive substances in Georgia. It was stated that the implementation of relevant legislation is being conducted effectively and that the situation concerning illicit traffic in new psychoactive substances is stable. The parties discussed the draft of the first quarterly report on activities of the Commission, presented by the Ministry of Internal Affairs; the report is to be published by the State Commission in accordance with the Law “On New Psychoactive Substances”.
The members of the State Commission also discussed the draft amendments to the Law “On New Psychoactive Substances”, which aim at effectively responding to the new challenges related to NPS.
Sopio Kiladze, Pro-rector of the MIA Academy especially highlighted the fact that since the entry into force of the Law of Georgia “On New Psychoactive Substances”, illicit traffic in NPS has been significantly reduced in Georgia, what clearly indicates the effectiveness of the Law. Since the entry into force of the Law in May 2014, criminal cases have been initiated on 26 facts of illicit traffic in new psychoactive substances, while in August only 11 criminal cases have been initiated, indicating the reduction tendency in import of psychoactive substances. Vladimer Khundadze, Head of Customs Department of the Ministry of Finance, stated that since the entry into force of the Law on May 1, the import of new psychoactive substances across the borders has been minimized. If before May 1 there were dozens of cases of ordering NPS by internet and importing them across the borders of Georgia per month, after May 1 only one or two similar cases have occurred so far. It should be noted that in May-August of 2013, 69 cases of importing psychoactive substances took place at the borders, while in the similar period of 2014 only 6 cases have been identified, what also indicates the reduction of importing these substances to Georgia and the effectiveness of the new regulation.
At the Meeting the agencies positively assessed the active measures carried out in order to create online database on the list of new psychoactive substances, what will contribute to the effectiveness of the fight against illicit traffic in new psychoactive substances.
