For decades, the annual United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) gatherings in New York have served as a global stage for world leaders to address the planet’s most pressing problems. Usually, the headlines are dominated by talk of wars, climate change, and economic woes. But this year, something different happened: the world’s drug crisis took center stage, sparking heated debate, calls for cooperation, and a rare sense of urgency about a problem that’s been quietly growing for years.
On September 25, 2025, the UNGA placed unprecedented focus on drug issues, a marked shift from years past where such topics were often pushed to the margins. According to AP, the moment was anything but routine. U.S. President Donald Trump, never one to shy from a fight, kicked off the debate with a warning: "To every terrorist thug smuggling poisonous drugs into the United States of America: Please be warned that we will blow you out of existence." Trump touted his administration’s aggressive drug enforcement, including designating several Latin American cartels as foreign terrorist organizations and authorizing military strikes on suspected drug trafficking vessels in the southern Caribbean.
But not everyone was buying the hardline approach. Colombia’s President Gustavo Petro, speaking just hours after Trump, fired back with a stinging rebuke. Petro accused the U.S. of ignoring its own domestic drug problems while demonizing Colombia, saying, "The U.S. anti-drug policy is not aimed at the public health of a society, but rather to prop up a policy of domination." Petro went so far as to argue that Trump should face criminal charges for attacks on unarmed "young people who were simply trying to escape poverty." The U.S. had recently listed Colombia as falling short of its international drug control obligations for the first time in decades, a move that further strained relations.
These exchanges exposed deep fissures in the international community’s approach to drug policy. As Vanda Felbab-Brown, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, told AP, "The international system is extremely divided on drug policy. This is not new, but it’s really just very intense at this UNGA." While the wars in Gaza and Ukraine, and climate change, still dominated much of the week’s agenda, the drug debate was impossible to ignore.
And the numbers are sobering. According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), 316 million people worldwide used marijuana, opioids, or other drugs in 2023—a staggering 28% rise over the last decade. The World Health Organization (WHO) puts the 2020 figure at 275 million, with around 36 million suffering from drug use disorders. These statistics don’t even include alcohol or tobacco, underscoring the magnitude of the crisis.
Regional trends highlight the complexity of the problem. Cocaine use is surging in Europe, methamphetamine is on the rise in Southeast Asia, and synthetic opioids are making new inroads in West and Central Africa. North America, while still grappling with the opioid epidemic, has seen a slight decline in opioid-related deaths. The UNODC warns that drug trafficking is increasingly dominated by organized crime groups with global reach, making the challenge even more daunting. As Jeremy Douglas, chief of staff at the agency, explained, "Governments are increasingly seeing organized crime and drug trafficking as threats to national and regional security and stability…we’re at a point where this needs to, and hopefully will, change."
The economic fallout is equally dire. Countries battling high rates of drug abuse face ballooning healthcare costs, lost productivity, and social services stretched to the breaking point. Drug trafficking can destabilize entire economies, especially in regions where the illegal trade is rampant. Panama's President José Raúl Mulino told the assembly his country had seized a "historic and alarming" 150 tons of cocaine and other drugs in 2025 alone—evidence, he argued, of the scale and urgency of the problem.
Despite the gravity of the crisis, the world remains deeply divided on how to respond. Some nations, like the United States, favor tough enforcement and punitive measures. Others, including Portugal and Switzerland, have pioneered public health approaches that prioritize treatment over punishment. Portugal’s 2001 decision to decriminalize all drug possession and redirect users to treatment programs led to a significant decrease in drug-related deaths and HIV infection rates. Switzerland’s harm reduction policies, including supervised injection sites and access to clean needles, have produced lower overdose deaths and improved public health in urban areas. These models, highlighted during the UNGA, offer a glimpse of what’s possible when countries dare to break from tradition.
The debate isn’t just among governments. Civil society organizations and advocacy groups played an active role at the 2023 and 2025 assemblies, urging leaders to adopt inclusive, evidence-based drug policies. Their message: punitive drug control has led to deaths, disease, and racial disparities. The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, has called for decriminalizing at least some drug use and "clamping down on illegal markets," arguing that "the so-called war on drugs has failed, completely and utterly." A recent UN Development Programme report echoed these concerns, warning that harsh drug laws drive users underground, making them less likely to seek help and increasing the risk of harm.
Even former leaders joined the fray. Ernesto Zedillo, former president of Mexico and now a Yale professor, lamented at a UN event that "the global drug control regime has become a substantial part of the problem." He posed a challenge to governments everywhere: "The question is: Do governments have the wisdom and courage to act?"
Finding common ground remains elusive. Nations’ drug laws are all over the map—some impose the death penalty for drug crimes, others have legalized or decriminalized marijuana, and at least one (Thailand) legalized it only to reconsider and tighten the rules again. Acceptance of harm reduction strategies such as needle exchange programs and safe injection sites varies widely. As Felbab-Brown noted, even when countries agree on the goal of ending the drug trade, "the objectives might be different, and certain means, tools, resources they’re willing to devote to them, are different."
Leaders from around the globe used their time at the UNGA podium to highlight the threat of drug trafficking. Tajikistan’s President Emomali Rahmon called it "a serious threat to global security." Guyana’s President Irfaan Ali listed drug trafficking among the "crimes that are destroying the lives of our people, especially young people." Syria’s new president, Ahmad al-Sharaa, pointed to his administration’s closure of Captagon factories as a sign of progress. Costa Rica’s Foreign Minister Arnoldo André Tinoco warned that traffickers are exploiting migrant routes, saying, "Isolated responses are insufficient," since smugglers simply shift to new hotspots. Peru’s President Dina Boluarte grouped transnational organized crime and drug trafficking with political polarization and climate change, arguing, "None of these problems is merely national, but rather global. This is why we need the United Nations to once again be a forum for dialogue and cooperation."
So, what’s next? This year’s focus on drugs at the UNGA marks a possible turning point. The path forward, as outlined by many speakers and experts, includes developing evidence-based policies that prioritize health and human rights, enhancing international collaboration, involving affected communities in policymaking, and establishing robust monitoring and evaluation systems to track what works—and what doesn’t. The world’s drug crisis is not going away quietly, but there’s hope that, with collective resolve, the global community can finally make real progress.
After years in the shadows, drugs have moved to the heart of the world’s diplomatic agenda. The question now is whether nations will seize this moment to forge a new, more united response—or let the opportunity slip away, leaving the crisis to grow in the dark once again.