Mexico is on the brink of legalizing cannabis after lawmakers voted to permit recreational use in a step towards curbing the power of the country’s drug cartels and the narcotics-related violence that claims thousands of lives a year.
The legislation backed by Mexican president Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador looks almost certain to be approved after a 316-129 vote in Mexico’s lower house.
The move to allow people to carry up to one ounce (28 grams) of cannabis and grow up to eight plants at home for personal consumption would create what has been described as ‘the largest legal market in the world’ in a country of 126million people.
It would make Mexico one of only a few countries, alongside Uruguay and Canada, to legalise cannabis for recreational use.
A supporter of the marijuana bill smokes a joint outside the Mexican congress on Tuesday ahead of the vote in the chamber of deputies which supported legalization
Activists installed cannabis plants outside the Mexican Senate ahead of the vote, which is set to make Mexico one of the few countries in the world to decriminalize the drug
Lawmakers who supported the bill said it would ‘contribute to achieving peace’ following the deaths of more than 300,000 people in a bloody war with the cartels.
Supporters hope that creating a legal, regulated market will deprive the cartels of their market and empty prisons of small-time weed users.
‘Today we are making history,’ said Simey Olvera, a lawmaker from…
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Mexico is on the brink of legalizing cannabis after lawmakers voted to permit recreational use in a step towards curbing the power of the country’s drug cartels and the narcotics-related violence that claims thousands of lives a year.
The legislation backed by Mexican president Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador looks almost certain to be approved after a 316-129 vote in Mexico’s lower house.
The move to allow people to carry up to one ounce (28 grams) of cannabis and grow up to eight plants at home for personal consumption would create what has been described as ‘the largest legal market in the world’ in a country of 126million people.
It would make Mexico one of only a few countries, alongside Uruguay and Canada, to legalise cannabis for recreational use.
A supporter of the marijuana bill smokes a joint outside the Mexican congress on Tuesday ahead of the vote in the chamber of deputies which supported legalization
Activists installed cannabis plants outside the Mexican Senate ahead of the vote, which is set to make Mexico one of the few countries in the world to decriminalize the drug
Lawmakers who supported the bill said it would ‘contribute to achieving peace’ following the deaths of more than 300,000 people in a bloody war with the cartels.
Supporters hope that creating a legal, regulated market will deprive the cartels of their market and empty prisons of small-time weed users.
‘Today we are making history,’ said Simey Olvera, a lawmaker from…