REGIONAL OVERVIEW: EURASIA

REREGGIONIALO OVERNVIEWAL EURASIA 1 OVERVIEW: EURASIA THE GLOBAL STATE THE GLOBAL STATE OF HARM REDUCTION 2024 OF HARM REDUCTION 2024 AUTHOR OF EURASIA REGIONAL OVERVIEW: Maria Plotko Maria Plotko is the Senior Programme Officer at the Eurasian Harm Reduction Association. [...] Harm this issue are four main laws: the law on foreign reduction through an HIV lens was and still is agents, the law on undesirable organisations, and politically safer in the region, while drug policy the so-called drug and LGBTQI+ propaganda laws. [...] In the same same time, the Georgian parliament has advanced year, laws similar to the Russian Foreign Agent law the set of bills that include bans on promoting were adopted in Kyrgyzstan and Georgia.12 Serbia13 same-sex relationships and gender reassignment and Bosnia and Herzegovina14 also attempted surgeries.21 to pass similar laws but were unsuccessful. [...] These countries include Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Belarus, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Hungary and Georgia.” THE GLOBAL STATE OF HARM REDUCTION 2024 REGIONAL OVERVIEW EURASIA 9 KEY ISSUE CHALLENGES ADVANCING DRUG CHECKING SERVICES The implementation of drug checking services in In Slovenia, drug checking is part of the National Eurasia, despite operating in a legally grey area, Early Warning. [...] In 2023, to expand the health and wellbeing of people who use drugs drug checking in the country, the Addiction Research and addressing the evolving challenges of drug Centre Alternative Georgia started providing drug use, particularly in relation to the spread of new checking kits through syringe vending machines in psychoactive substances in the region.