Maastricht coffee shops on trial for selling weed to Belgians

Owners and staff of three cannabis-selling cafes went on trial yesterday in the southern Netherlands charged with selling cannabis to foreigners, in a case both sides of a heated drug debate in this border city hope will clarify the legality of a clampdown on so-called "coffee shops", writes Associated Press’s Mike Corder. Maastricht, which lies on the Belgian border, is using new national legislation banning coffee shops from selling cannabis and marijuana to people who don't live in the Netherlands as a way of clamping down on what the local mayor says was a nuisance caused by hundreds of thousands of drug tourists driving into the picturesque heart of the city to stock up on weed. The cafe owners and staff being prosecuted were arrested last month after serving foreign customers as a way of testing the legality of the new rules. A second group of owners is due in court later this month and verdicts are expected in mid-July. Prosecutors asked judges to fine the seven suspects up to €5,000 and give them community service orders and short suspended prison sentences. In an interview, Maastricht mayor Onno Hoes defended the crackdown on coffee shops as an effective way of reining in problems caused by drug tourists who cross the nearby borders with Belgium and Germany to buy cannabis in officially tolerated cafes. "Those people cause a lot of problems in the city. They park badly, they drive too fast (…). They leave litter on the streets and they attract illegal dealers," he said. Maastricht differs from Amsterdam - where authorities continue to allow tourists into coffee shops because of the economic boost they give the city - in that its drug tourists mostly arrive by car from neighbouring countries and then leave immediately. Foreign tourists in Amsterdam more often arrive by train or plane and stick around to visit the city's museums and other attractions as well as its famed coffee shops.

But some Maastricht residents say that banning coffee shops from selling to foreigners has simply pushed the problem onto the city's streets where dealers are now plying their trade. A large part of the pragmatic motivation for the Netherlands' longstanding tolerance of coffee shops was to prevent smokers of cannabis and marijuana coming into contact with harder drugs like cocaine and heroin via street dealers.  Police have put more officers on the street to crack down on illegal dealing, but city police chief John Bloebaum said the crime is now dropping off again as are complaints from local residents. Police cars and motorcycles now regularly cruise on a road alongside the river to deter illegal drug dealers from plying their trade. "The police are very active," Hoes said. "We won't tolerate dealing on the streets."