NEW YORK. – The departing Mexican president, Felipe Calderon, demanded the drug-consumer countries take "strong" measures to stop the capital flow to criminal groups and urged the United Nations to tackle the illegal drug industry outside of the current prohibitionist approach.

"The time for consumer countries to sincerely evaluate if they can significantly reduce their consumption has arrived; if they cannot, it is urgent that they take strong measures to at least stop the massive flow of money to criminals," said Calderon to a full UN General Assembly.

President Calderon stated that the main power criminal organizations have comes from the "multimillionaire" economic resources they receive from consumer countries and warned that while this "mountain of money" doesn't stop, organized crime will continue to "compromise" peace and "stalk" governments and societies.

The Mexican president said that if consumer countries "can't or won't" assume their share of responsibility in the fight against drug traffickers, then the moment to open a "deep" international debate to balance the current "prohibitionist approach" has arrived.

In his last intervention at the UN's General Assembly before surrendering the command of the country in December, he demanded the organization to lead a discussion "fit for the XXI century" about the fight against drugs that is "free of prejudice" and that allows for "new and efficient" solutions.

"Since the UN searches for solutions to global problems, takes care of hunger and global warming, it is time that it steps in to stop this death wave," said the president, regretting that Latin America has become the most violent region in the world due to drugs.

After reminding his audience that the violence of organized crime is one of the first causes of death and reiterating that the UN has the obligation of fighting "one of the biggest threats to democracy in the XXI century," he explained that Mexico is suffering the consequences and considers his fight against these groups as a "legal and moral" obligation.

The Mexican president also regretted that the efforts made by his country to fight organized crime "don't find an equitable response" in all countries, and he criticized the international community for being incapable of reaching an agreement on gun control last July.

"But the traffic of guns is just an edge of the problem. We have to recognize an unarguable truth: the consumption of illegal drugs in developed countries is causing thousands of deaths in the countries of production and transportation causing violence levels that our people don't deserve," he claimed.

The growing demand of drugs is giving criminals an "economic power" that allows them to buy off "almost any authority" according to Calderon, who also warned that the money sparks in criminals "such ambition" that they are capable of "committing the worst acts humanity has ever seen."

The Mexican president emphasized that the current "well intentioned" approach of keeping drugs away from youngsters through legally combating the offer has a problem: "the massive profit that comes from the black market, caused by the prohibition, have intensified the criminal's ambition."

Lastly, he said that there's still "a lot of work to be done" to reduce the demand and to prevent it, for which he advocated the duplication of efforts to fight this "public health" problem with preventive policies and campaigns to make young people understand that addictions are "the slavery of the XXI century."

Translation: karen.balderas@sandiegored.com