HISTORICAL LEGAL ASPECTS OF DEVELOPMENT OF INTERNATIONAL AND DOMESTIC LEGISLATION IN COMBATING ILLICIT TRAFFICKING IN NARCOTIC DRUGS AND PSYCHOTROPIC SUBSTANCES
Countering drug trafficking is a long-standing and difficult to resolve the problem of progressive humanity all over the world. For many decades, the issue of organizing counteraction to drug trafficking has been under special control of a number of States. Every day, the media reports on the seizure of large quantities of drugs, but it is too early to say about the final success in this fight. Russia is one of the countries where this problem is relevant. There is no doubt that "drug addiction is an absolute evil, respectively, drug trafficking is evil squared". It is obvious that the main efforts of the state in the fight against drug addiction should be focused not so much on consumers, who are themselves to a certain extent victims of their addiction and need more treatment than punishment, but on the suppression of the illegal drug trade. Methods of combating drugs are dictated by the spirit of the time of a particular historical period. The authors of the article consider the period of modern history, starting from the birth of the Soviet state (October 1917) to the present, through the prism of socio-economic and political processes taking place in the country, which undoubtedly affect the development of criminalistic and legal institutions to combat drug trafficking. In this article, the authors analyze legislation in the field of countering illicit trafficking in narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances from the point of view of its historical and legal development at the international and domestic levels. The authors consider international and domestic anti-drug legislation in the context of the recent historical period in order to develop solutions to improve the current legislation in the field of countering illicit drug trafficking. As a result of the research, the authors conclude that the legislation does not always respond in a timely manner to changing forms and methods of drug distribution. In modern conditions, drug crime actively uses developing areas of science and technology, the results of which serve as means of drug distribution.