Annette Verster works for the HIV/AIDS Department of the World Health Organization in Geneva, she coordinates all activities related to HIV prevention. She speaks about the conclusions of an investigation on on prisons and harm reduction which WHO commissioned recently. We interviewed her at the International Conference on the Reduction of Drug Related Harms in Warsaw, May 2007.
Watch our new movie on the new approach to drug policy in the state of Washington, where people voted yes to tax and regulate marijuana
Orosz Béla was fined 50 thousand forints for a minor offence. In a letter sent on August 8th, he informed the police that because of his poverty, he cannot pay the fine, but would like to work off his debts through community service. He did not receive a response from the police. Two months later, the courts informed him that they will hold a hearing regarding the conversion of his fine into a prison sentence. This procedure is illegal; the judicial authorities disregarded the laws relating to offences.
HCLU (Hungarian Civil Liberties Union) and ERRC (European Roma Rights Center) have called into account Máté Szabó, Parliamentary Commissioner of Civil Rights in Hungary, with a corporate submission in order to conduct an investigation, and gain an explanation as to why people living in abject poverty are being evicted from local governments’ tenements- the equivalent of making them homeless. Specialists of HCLU Roma Programme, doing fieldwork in Borsod-Abaúj-Zemplém county (Hungary), have received numerous annunciations from Roma families who had been evicted or were on the verge of being evicted by the local governments.