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WE, THE
UNDERSIGNED, subscribe to the following declaration, produced
as a result of the International Forum on the Coca Leaf "A
Week of Peace with Coca", which took place in Lima, Peru,
from 4th to 8th April 2005.
WE NOTE
the absence of a political opening which would allow a discussion
of the benefic uses of this plant, or permit a re-examination
of the unjust prohibition to which it has been subject by
the relevant UN Conventions.
WE CALL
FOR
1 - A defense of the traditional use of our Sacred Leaf that,
for millennia, has been used both in traditional medicine
and in ancestral rites, in an intimate connection that has
allowed the physical permanence of our peoples and cultures.
2 - Considering
that coca is a legitmate agricultural product, we firmly reject
its criminalization and refute the tendentious confusion between
coca growers and drug traffickers.
3 - We
wish to disseminate, both regionally and internationally,
knowledge of the nutritional, medicinal and new industrial
uses of this plant in order to impede the eradication of coca
crops.
4 - We
request, with utmost urgency, that States and international
organizations initiate a serious debate on reform of the laws
that have condemned this ancestral teaching plant.
