Are Benzodiazepines legal in Colombia?

Legal status

Controlled, resolved member by member. All six members of this class among the 88 carry their own entry in Anexo Técnico 1 of Resolución 116 de 2026: Alprazolam at entry 93, Clonazepam at 147, Diazepam at 173, Lorazepam at 280, Etizolam at 217 and Nimetazepam at 344, every one of them on the Lista Verde, Lista IV. The class label itself is not an entry. [Certain]

Consequences if caught

Capital exposure: none. Article 11 of the Constitución Política reads, in its own words, that el derecho a la vida es inviolable and that no habrá pena de muerte, so no Colombian drug offence carries a capital penalty. [Certain] Penal Code article 376, as replaced by article 11 of Ley 1453 de 2011, punishes unauthorised import, transit, export, transport, carrying, storage, keeping, manufacture, sale, offer, acquisition, financing or supply of a narcotic, psychotropic or synthetic drug contemplated in schedules one, two, three and four of the 1971 United Nations Convention on Psychotropic Substances, with 128 to 360 months of imprisonment and a fine of 1,334 to 50,000 monthly legal minimum wages. Its second and third paragraphs graduate that by quantity, to 64 to 108 months up to 200 g of droga sintética and to 96 to 144 months up to 4,000 g. Article 384 doubles the minimum of those figures in its listed aggravations, among them use of a minor and commission in or near a school. [Certain] Ley 30 de 1986 article 2(j) fixes the dosis para uso personal at not more than 20 g of marihuana, 5 g of marihuana hachís, 1 g of cocaine or any cocaine-based substance and 2 g of metacualona, and adds that it is not a personal dose, whatever the quantity, where the purpose is distribution or sale. Sentencia C-221 de 1994 declared article 2(j) exequible and articles 51 and 87 of Ley 30 inexequibles, resting on article 16 of the Constitution, the right to the free development of personality. The protection is judicial rather than statutory: article 11 of Ley 1453 de 2011 rewrote article 376 without the words salvo lo dispuesto sobre dosis para uso personal that the earlier text carried, and Sentencia C-491 de 2012 then upheld the rewritten article only on the understanding that it does not criminalise carrying or keeping a dose exclusively destined for personal consumption. Decriminalised is not the same as lawful: sale and supply stay criminal at any quantity. No printed figure covers this substance. [Certain] The member-by-member check was run and every one of the six members among the 88 was found, so this row does not rest on a class reading. Each member entry carries the Lista Verde, which the source note to Anexo Técnico 4 identifies as the list of psychotropic substances under international control, so article 376 reaches each of them on the article's own words. The annex lists about forty further benzodiazepines that are not among the 88, among them bromazepam, clobazam, clordiazepóxido, flunitrazepam, midazolam, oxazepam and triazolam. [Certain]

If prescribed or medical

Colombia's traveller rule runs through the medicamentos de control especial regime. Anexo Técnico 3 names Alprazolam, Clonazepam, Diazepam and Lorazepam on its human medicamentos de control especial list, and article 1 of Resolución 116 de 2026 extends that control to every medicine with two or more active principles containing them and to every pharmaceutical form, concentration and presentation authorised by INVIMA or by ICA, without the list being updated. Etizolam and nimetazepam are on no Anexo Técnico 3 list, so the resolution shows no prescribable form for those two. Ley 30 de 1986 article 3 limits the use and possession of estupefacientes to medical and scientific ends under Ministry of Health regulation, and article 20(a) routes import and sale through the Fondo. Penal Code article 379 punishes a doctor, dentist, nurse or pharmacist who illegally prescribes, supplies or applies a dependence-producing drug with 48 to 144 months and 80 to 180 months of professional disqualification. The specific traveller certificate requirements were not established in this pass, because Resolución 1478 de 2006 could not be retrieved from an official source. [Certain] as to the listing.

Documentation

Carry any controlled medicine in its original labelled packaging with the prescription. Import, export, processing, synthesis, manufacture, distribution, purchase, sale and use of the substances under fiscalización run through the Unidad Administrativa Especial Fondo Nacional de Estupefacientes or the Fondos Rotatorios de Estupefacientes, and article 3 of Resolución 116 de 2026 allows one month for bencilfentanilo and anhídrido propiónico and six months for the other newly incorporated substances and medicines to register. Constitution article 49, as amended by Acto Legislativo 02 de 2009, provides that el porte y el consumo de sustancias estupefacientes o sicotrópicas está prohibido, salvo prescripción médica. Two official portals print different current texts of article 49 and that conflict is recorded here rather than resolved, so no adult-use permission is asserted in this cell. The resolution prints its entry names in capitals and they are given here in title case. The six members of this class among the 88 are listed at entries 93, 147, 173, 217, 280 and 344. [Certain] Re-derived in this pass and restored, because it was on the live cell for this row and on none of the replacements I first built: Ley 1787 de 2016 is the medicinal and scientific cannabis statute, and it works on the Penal Code directly. The consolidated text of Código Penal article 375 carries the note Inciso adicionado por el artículo 12 del Ley 1787 de 2016, and article 377 carries Inciso adicionado por el artículo 14 del Ley 1787 de 2016. Those added paragraphs are what take licensed medicinal and scientific handling out of the cultivation and possession-of-plant offences. Recreational sale is untouched by them and remains criminal.

Drug laws and enforcement change and vary within a country. This is not legal advice. Always confirm with Colombia’s embassy or official drug authority before traveling; penalties can be severe, including imprisonment.