The story · written by gpt-6,
Algeria’s July 2025 amendment restored capital punishment for specified aggravated drug offences and expanded other sentencing rules.[1] It also required the maximum legal penalty when examinations established that an offender was under the influence of drugs when committing an offence.[1]
Capital punishment returns to the drug law
The amendment attached death sentences to specified supply-related offences where drugs caused death or threatened serious harm to public health.[1] The same penalty applied in listed circumstances including a transnational organised criminal group and using or threatening to use a firearm.[1]
Other listed grounds concerned national security, creating insecurity or public disorder, and acting at the instigation or for the benefit of a foreign state.[1] The clause referred to particular production, supply, import and precursor offences.[1]
Earlier legislation had already contained a drug-law capital clause.[2][3] The 1985 health law allowed it for specified trafficking and facilitation offences.[2][3] The 2004 replacement law repealed those provisions and used prison terms extending to life.[2][3]
Recruitment and repeat offences face heavier penalties
The new law imposed twenty to thirty years for recruiting or using a minor, a person with particular needs, or a person receiving addiction treatment in listed drug activities.[1] Higher penalties applied at specified locations, reaching death where the offence took place in or near educational and training establishments.[1]
It also revised repeat-offence rules.[1] Where an offence already carried life imprisonment, repetition could bring a death sentence.[1] Other prison ranges were increased according to the schedule set out in the amendment.[1]
Tests can affect both punishment and care
The maximum-penalty rule applied when biological, hospital or medical examinations established drug influence during the offence.[1] Investigators could order examinations in the circumstances stated in the law, and refusing them attracted the specified penalties.[1]
A different rule concerned pupils’ periodic medical examinations.[1] These could include early drug-use screening with the consent of their legal representatives or, where appropriate, the juvenile judge.[1] Positive results led to the prescribed care measures, with protection from prosecution based on those results and restrictions on their further use.[1]
The law also required negative drug-screening results in recruitment files for listed public and private-sector bodies, with implementing details left to regulation where needed.[1]
The amendment combines distinct approaches
Promulgated on 1 July and published on 13 July, the law paired more severe sentencing with further treatment and reintegration provisions.[1] In Algeria, those rules concern different circumstances: aggravated supply, offending under drug influence, and people entering the prescribed care routes.[1]
Score by segment 0 to 10
- Possession · 25%0 → 0
- Personal cultivation · 25%1 → 1
- Punishment & enforcement · 20%2 → 1−1
- Sharing & gifting · 10%0 → 0
- Consumption · 10%1 → 1
- Legal access · 10%0 → 0
The bar shows the score after the change; the tick marks where it stood before. The scores after the change are Algeria's current scores.
References
- Algerian Official Gazette 43, 13 July 2025 — Law 25-03 of 1 JulyPrinted pp. 3–6: Articles 5 bis 10, 16 bis 2, 21 bis–21 bis 2, 26 bis and 27archived
- Algerian Official Gazette 83, 26 December 2004 — Law 04-18 of 25 DecemberPrinted pp. 3–7: Articles 4–13, 17–20, 26–27 and 38archived
- Algerian Official Gazette 8, 17 February 1985 — Law 85-05 of 16 FebruaryPrinted pp. 138–140: Articles 243–253 and 268; original scanarchived
Checked. The date and the event were compared with a source that was read. The score before the change is an editorial estimate.