Marijuana

The only effect the new Opium Act had is that coffeeshops are now getting more cannabis from abroad. The major illegal cannabis cultivators did not stop their activities, they simply moved them to outside the Netherlands, BNR reports based on information from several experts and people from the soft drugs industry.

Housing firm Eigen Haard gave Amsterdam HIV patient Rudolf Hillebrand an ultimatum - either stop cultivating his own cannabis, or leave his apartment. This is despite the fact that the court ruled that Hillebrand can continue growing his own cannabis.

Some 1 billion euros in cannabis is produced in Brabant alone, the police announced in a special broadcast of Bureau Brabant in which attention was paid to subversive crime in the province. "Brabanders can definitely not smoke so much weed. A large part is therefore intended for export", the police said.

The court in Leeuwarden has found Doede de Jong, the 66 year old marijuana farmer from Appelscha, guilty of illegal cannabis cultivation in the appeal on Thursday. He did not, however, get any form of punishment. The Public Prosecutor demanded 180 hours of community service and a conditional prison sentence of two months against him.

Tourists and other foreigners will remain banned from coffee shops in Maastricht. New mayor Annemarie Penn-te Strake does not want to return to the previous situation, in which the city had many problems caused by drug tourists.

Alex O., the 50 year old man arrested on Friday in connection with the Jumbo supermarket bombings and extortion, was the mastermind behind a series of very violent robberies in the 1990's. He was sentenced to 14 years in prison by the court in Leeuwarden in 1993.

The city of Utrecht, as well as the cities of Rotterdam, Nijmegen, Eindhoven, Heerlen and Tilburg, are still investigating whether cannabis cultivation can be regulated, Utrecht announced on Monday. The Tweede Kamer, lower house of parliament, is still opposed to the idea, saying that regulation does not contribute to the fight against organized crime and that it is contrary to international obligations.

Thursday was a big day for drug busts in the Dutch province of Noord-Brabant. Authorities there made two major busts in different regions of the country, with investigators seizing nearly a ton of cocaine and marijuana combined.

According to Amsterdam Mayor Eberhard van der Laan, it is currently legally impossible to start with an experiment on regulated cannabis cultivation. But he promises to continue to work hard in The Hague for permission to perform such an experiment.

The Rotterdam Hit And Run Cargo Team found 2,800 kilograms of cannabis, worth about 10 million euros in a container after the arrest of a Customs officer, according to the Public Prosecutor.

A business premises on Kooikerstraat in Tilburg from where The Grass Company coffee shops are supplied, has been closed down for 6 months. Mayor Peter Noordanus made this decision on Thursday after large quantities of cannabis were discovered in a hidden room.