In recent years the threat of new drugs and multidrug mixtures has been steadily rising as a result of changing social mores and the emergence of new classes of compounds. The Executive Yuan launched the New Generation Anti-drug Strategy in May 2017 and issued a charter for action in July of the same year. On the legislative front, amendments to the Narcotics Hazard Prevention Act were passed in 2017 to increase criminal liability for drug dealing and curb the proliferation of new drugs, and in 2018 revisions to the Organized Crime Prevention Act broadened the definition of a criminal organization to make it easier to prosecute groups involved in selling drugs.
To ensure that the New Generation Anti-drug Strategy reaches its full potential, operation "safe home" was initiated in 2018, with major sweeps in February and June. The objective is to prevent the import of drugs from abroad, stop shipments at the border, and track down dealers within Taiwan.
Three measures to eradicate drugs
Prosecutors, police, investigators, the Coast Guard Administration, Customs Administration, and military police work together to build a finely meshed nationwide network to combat drugs. The operational principles of this effort are cooperating among units, embedding deeply within communities, and tracing illicit drugs to their source.
◆ Undertaking group cooperation: Prosecutors, police, investigators, the Coast Guard Administration, Customs Administration, and military police work cooperatively across the eight regions defined by the Taiwan High Prosecutors Office, sharing information and the results of investigations in order to claim a collective victory in the fight against drug crimes.
◆ Embedding deeply within communities: Authorities are moving forcefully to investigate and rein in drug activity in areas most seriously affected, with an emphasis on quashing drug dealing within communities. Efforts are being made to integrate such private-sector resources as building security and resident committees in the battle against drugs. Aggressive action is also being directed at areas where users congregate, where young people are more easily lured into group drug use, and drug transaction hot spots.
◆ Tracing illicit drugs to their source: In addition to going after drug users, authorities are devoting even greater effort to investigating upstream operators such as drug manufacturers, dealers and traffickers, in order to eliminate the problem at the source and cut off supplies.