The campaign launched this month follows the announcement last year in Marseille - the southern port city plagued by gang violence - of a plan to boost police and courts resources in their fight against organized crime, and of the planned appointment of a liaison magistrate in Colombia, which is one of the main cocaine producing countries alongside Peru and Bolivia.
Amid record cocaine seizures and deadly shootings, the slogan is simple and aims to raise awareness among France’s millions of recreational drug users that their habits are fuelling gang violence and death.
France targets traffickers and recreational drug users as minister warns of a 'tsunami of cocaine' “Every day, people pay the price for the drugs you buy.”.
With its new campaign against drug use and trafficking, the French government not only wants to make society aware, but also to make it clear that users will be punished.
“I want to break with this logic of victimisation, which consists of presenting drug users exclusively as victims of an addiction,” Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau told reporters on Thursday at the launch of an anti-drugs campaign.
