Cannabis in Kosovo is illegal for both medicinal or recreational purposes.[1][2] Penalties are defined by Article 269 of the Kosovo Criminal Code, last revised in January 2019. For first-time offenders, possession of illicit substances leads to either a one-year sentence or, more likely, a financial penalty of €250-300.[3] A 2014 survey of 5500 reported that 10% of Kosovans knew someone who had used cannabis and 12.6% reported having easy access to cannabis.[3]

History

The Kingdom of Yugoslavia ratified the International Opium Convention on 4 September 1929.[4] The first law to sanction drug abuse was the Criminal Code of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes passed on 27 January 1929 and which entered into force on 1 January 1930, which sets a prison sentence of up to 6 months for "serving" narcotic drugs in the section "Crimes against Public Health".[5]

Trafficking

Since the Kosovo War, organised crime in Kosovo has engaged in the trafficking of drugs including marijuana alongside heroin and cocaine. Kosovo acts as a transit hub for traffic between Afghanistan and Italy,[6] and from Albania to the rest of Europe.[7] From 2001 to 2007, a total of 286.89 kg of cannabis was seized by Kosovo Police.[8] Cannabis is cultivated in Kosovo, for domestic use primarily. The cultivation of cannabis is spread in most parts of the country's territory.[9][10]

References

  1. ↑ "Legal status of cannabis in Kosovo - Cannaconnection.com". www.cannaconnection.com. Retrieved 2021-04-03.
  2. ↑ "Kosovo : Is Cannabis Legal Yet?". iscannabislegalyet.com. Retrieved 2021-04-03.
  3. 1 2 "Kosovo should consider legalizing cannabis - Kosovo 2.0Kosovo 2.0". Kosovo 2.0. 2019-10-21. Retrieved 2021-04-03.
  4. ↑ "United Nations Treaty Collection". treaties.un.org. Retrieved 2021-04-03.
  5. ↑ Criminal Code of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes. Belgrade: Državna štamparija. 1929. pp. 70–71.
  6. ↑ "CRIME AND ITS IMPACT ON THE BALKANS and affected countries" (PDF). United Nations. Retrieved 23 February 2013. For the purposes of this Report, the Balkans comprises the nine nations of the Stability Pact: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, Romania, and Serbia. (The report does not contain any data for Kosovo.)
  7. ↑ Daase, Christopher; Vojin, Dimitrijevic; van Duyne, Petrus; Benedek, Wolfgang, eds. (2010), Transnational Terrorism, Organized Crime and Peace-Building: Human Security in the Western Balkans, Palgrave Macmillan, p. 152, ISBN 9780230234628
  8. ↑ "IMAGE MATTERS! Deconstructing Kosovo's Image Problem" (PDF). November 2008. p. 24. Archived from the original (PDF) on 3 December 2013.
  9. ↑ "Country overview: Kosovo (under UNSCR 1244/99)". EMCDDA. Archived from the original on 16 March 2016. Retrieved 23 February 2013.
  10. ↑ Nuhiu, Bajram (2019). "Drug situation in Kosovo" (PDF). LEPH 2019. Kosovo Police. LEPH. Retrieved 2021-04-03.
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