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Response Beyond Borders

Bangkok (Thailand), 5 February 2010 - The Second Asian Consultation on the Prevention of HIV Related to Drug Use/ Response Beyond Borders (RBB) took place from 21 to 23 January 2010 in Bangkok. The Consultation was opened, among others, by Mr Geoff Manthey, UNAIDS RST Acting Co-chair of the UN Regional Task Force on Injecting Drug Use and HIV/AIDS for Asia and the Pacific.

The Asian Consortium on Drug Use, HIV, AIDS and Poverty, in collaboration with the Asian Forum of Parliamentarians on Population and Development and the Asian Network of People Who Use Drugs (ANPUD), has provided a strategic platform for consulting, organizing and mobilizing support for the protection of human rights of all drug users, hence crafting an Asian response to the double HIV and drug use epidemics. This is part of a process that started with the First Asian Consultation (held in Goa, India, in January 2008) and went on to include three follow-up workshops (in East, South and Central Asia), as well as The 9th International Congress on AIDS in Asia and the Pacific (ICAAP).

The Second Asian Consultation was attended by approximately 300 people representing drug users' networks, NGOs, parliamentarians, donors, civil societies, United Nations agencies and others. The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, the World Bank, the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), UNODC and the World Health Organization provided financial and technical support. The UNODC regional offices in Bangkok and New Delhi were significantly involved in planning the Second Asian Consultation and were also supportive of the First Asian Consultation on matters of HIV services in prison and of HIV risks and human rights in relation to the increasing use of compulsory drug dependence treatment centres in the region.

At the Second Asian Consultation, the following five Tracks were addressed:

- The risk of HIV transmission among young people who use drugs
- The Asian Network of People Who Use Drugs and similar local networks
- Parliamentarians and harm reduction
- The risk of HIV transmission and human rights in compulsory drug dependence treatment centres
- The risk of HIV transmission among the wives and intimate partners of drug users

The UNODC Regional Centre for East Asia and the Pacific provided full technical support for the " Track on the Treatment and Policy Environments/the compulsory drug dependence treatment centres"; a regional overview of HIV-related risks; the outcomes and recommendations that had emerged from the "Track on the Treatment and Policy Environments/the compulsory drug dependence treatment centres, in collaboration with the Western Pacific Region Office of the World Health Organization and a closing speech by UNODC Regional Representative Gary Lewis.

For more information visit the website Response Beyond Border