Last year the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) merged its former Global Illict Drug Trends series with the World Drug Report, issued it in two volumes comprising Analysis and Statistics, and decided to make it an annual publication. Feedback on the new format and frequency has been positive. There is also continuing evidence that the world needs such annual assessments from the United Nations. They help the international community to judge where it is, how it is performing, and whether it is reaching the targets it sets for itself. Particularly in areas as globally inter-connected as drugs and crime, such assessments also help individual countries - the building blocks of the international community - to steer their own ways forward. |