Pulling the plug on drug detention centres in Asia

“No treatment for the disease of addiction was available there. Once a month or so we marched around for a couple of hours chanting slogans”, Huong Son, who had been detained for 4 years in a so-called drug treatment centre in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, told Human Rights Watch (HRW). Son’s and many other testimonies form the basis of a new HRW report—Torture in the name of treatment—which documents human rights abuses in such centres (more accurately called drug detention centres) in Vietnam, China, Cambodia, and Laos.

More than 350 000 people identified as drug users are currently being held in drug detention centres in China and southeast Asia. These centres claim to be for drug treatment and rehabilitation. In truth, they are forced labour camps where those inside, who are detained arbitrarily, are tortured and forced to undertake military drills, chant slogans, and work as supposed forms of therapy. Effective treatments for illicit drug addiction do exist and include, for example, needle and syringe exchange programmes and opioid substitution for people who inject drugs. As HRW notes, they do not include “beatings, forced labour, and humiliation”.

The outcry over drug detention centres has been growing. In March, 12 UN agencies issued a joint statement calling for the closure of the centres and release of detained individuals without delay. However, ironically, countries that are against human rights abuses seem to be inadvertently supporting them in Asia. In June, the US Government pledged US$400 000 to support the Lao National Commission for Drug Control and Supervision to upgrade facilities at a detention centre that has been the focus of a previous HRW report. Concerns also exist over the conditions for participants in a study, partly funded by the USA, done at two drug rehabilitation centres in China.

Countries giving aid for, or supporting research on, drug addiction treatments in Asia should make sure their funds do not cause more harm than good. Ethical conduct by donor nations is needed alongside that of recipient countries for drug detention centres to be firmly consigned to the history books.

 

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