A new UN report released Thursday urged states to avoid unjustifiably labeling drug cartels and gangs as terrorist organizations, warning that a renewed “war on narco-terrorism” could violate human rights. The report was authored by Ben Saul, the UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms while countering terrorism.

Saul said organized drug violence and drug misuse threaten the rights to life, personal security and health, but governments must address those harms through lawful measures. He argued that organized criminal violence, although it may instill fear or coerce governments, requires a different legal response from terrorism. He called for terrorism to be limited to politically or ideologically motivated violence, excluding organized crime driven primarily by profit.

“Instead of unjustifiably invoking counter-terrorism, States should strengthen organized crime frameworks, law enforcement and intelligence capacities, financial investigations, anti-corruption and international cooperation and enhance controls on military-grade firearms,” Saul said. He also called for governments to address factors that can lead people to join criminal groups, including poverty, homelessness, food insecurity, inadequate public services and unresponsive governance.

The report also argues that increased designation of organized criminal groups, including gangs and drug cartels, as terrorist organizations has resulted in an expanded use of exceptional powers and more securitized responses. Saul cited the ‘Shield of the Americas’ initiative as an example of this trend.

The ‘Shield of the Americas‘ (also known as the Americas Counter Cartel Coalition or A3C) is a U.S.-led economic and security alliance launched by U.S. President Donald Trump in March 2026, comprising 19 participating nations across Latin America and the Caribbean. Its core purpose is to combat transnational crime, drug cartels, and “narco-terrorism,” secure energy and resource supply lines, and coordinate regional economic and security policies. Saul argued that decades of such responses in the Americas have frequently failed to reduce drug trafficking and have sometimes increased violence.

Saul argues that decades of highly securitised responses in the Americas have frequently failed to meet their objective of reducing drug trafficking and instead have often increased violence.

Militarised responses to the so-called ‘narco-terrorism’ have seriously violated human rights, including through arbitrary killings, torture, enforced disappearance and arbitrary detention. Prolonged states of emergency have restricted freedoms of movement, association, expression and peaceful assembly, and the rights of Indigenous communities.

“Decades of drug suppression efforts have failed, and a fresh approach is urgently needed,” Saul said. He urged states to reduce drug demand through education and public health campaigns, harm-reduction strategies and targeted legislation to regulate drugs and minimize criminal profits.