ASH, 102 Clifton Street, LONDON, EC2A 4HW.
Tel 020 7739 5902 Fax 020 7613 0531

ASH Daily News
31 October 2002


HEADLINES

The smoking gun behind US cigs in Baghdad
Public places charter slammed publicly
EU Legal committee derails its own tobacco ad ban
Express letter
Japan resists EU label ban

Imperial condemns Bill...
...(William remains unimpressed)

Did Customs really raise limits?



FULL TEXT


The smoking gun behind US cigs in Baghdad

Immediately after the Persian Gulf War ended in 1991, billions of Winstons
and other American-brand cigarettes began turning up inside Iraq. Even now,
the flow continues.

Under U.S. trade sanctions, companies that make cigarettes in the U.S. can't
knowingly sell them in the Iraqi market -- either directly or through
intermediaries -- unless they obtain a license from the U.S. government. The
company that produced many of those cigarettes for most of the past decade,
RJR Nabisco Corp.'s international tobacco unit, which was incorporated in
the U.S., never got a license. Neither did Japan Tobacco Inc., which
acquired the former RJR unit in 1999 and whose U.S. unit continued to
manufacture cigarettes in the U.S. until recently.

Now questions are mounting about whether RJR Nabisco's R.J. Reynolds Tobacco
International unit and Japan Tobacco, which is majority-owned by the
Japanese government, knew that their distributors were shipping cigarettes
to Iraq. One Middle East distributor claims he built a thriving market in
Iraq with the blessing of the former RJR unit. And European regulators claim
that employees connected to the tobacco companies visited Turkey as recently
as August 2001 to monitor the shipment of cigarettes from there into Iraq.
Lawyers for both companies deny any violation of U.S. law or of United
Nations economic sanctions against Iraq.

In depth WSJ article: http://www.ash.org.uk/html/smuggling/html/wsjiraq.html
Source: Wall Street Journal, 31 October 2002



Public places charter slammed publicly

The success of the hospitality industry’s charter in smoking in public
places suffered a PR setback by comments made in the Good Pub Guide, reports
the Publican.

In the introduction to the 2003 edition of the guide, editor Alisdair Aird
is critical of the charter, which aims to promote the use of signage with no
smoking areas and ventilation where possible.

He writes: “This year notices have cropped up in quite a few pubs, asserting
that smoking is allowed throughout the premises. These notices have been
produced and promoted by an outfit which gets funding from the Tobacco
Manufacturers Association. This flies directly in the face of the main
purpose of the legislation to prohibit cigarette advertising, which is of
course to stop the promotion of smoking itself.”

The comments have angered both the industry’s Charter Group and Atmosphere
Improves Results (AIR) initiative which seek to promote the charter, agreed
with the department of health in 1998.

Mr Aird told the Publican newspaper that he believes there to be an
insidious attempt by the tobacco industry to present the idea that smoking
is an acceptable practice at a time when public policy is moving against it.

Air recently revealed the results of their survey which suggested that most
pub-goers have a good understanding of what the charter signs mean, and
indeed are aware of the Public Places Charter itself. The survey also
suggests that almost a fifth of people would cease visiting pubs and bars or
at least go out frequently if smoking was restricted in pubs.

But Mr Aird challenges the finding by saying: “I know my readers well and
[provision of smoke free areas] is a an issue that concerns them greatly.
They are looking for somewhere they can eat an drink in a smoke-free
environment.

A spokesman for AIR said that the charter was working towards providing more
smoke-free areas and that the industry should be congratulated on its
efforts.

Source: Publican, 28 October 2002



EU Legal committee derails its own tobacco ad ban

In an extremely depressing development, the European Union’s plans for a ban
on tobacco advertising have been dealt a massive blow by proposals from one
of the European Parliaments own committees.

The EU legal affairs committee has put forward a series of amendments
arguing that the directive to ban tobacco advertising should be restricted
to cross border advertising and should not interfere with marketing
campaigns run in individual member states.

The proposal, which will render the directive useless has alarmed and
dismayed anti-smoking groups, who believe that the directive could now be
delayed for many months or scuppered altogether.

The expected delay in banning tobacco advertising at a European level does
not affect the UK Tobacco Advertising and Promotion Bill, which passed
through its final parliamentary stage earlier this month and is set to
become law next week.

Source: Marketing, 31 October 2002



Express letter

In an article (Is wonder drug worth the price? 29 October 2002) in the Daily
Express newspaper, the author wrote that cardiovascular disease causes heart
attacks and strokes, is by far Britain’s biggest killer.

Amanda Sandford of ASH writes in to suggest that one way helping to solve
the dilemma of how much to spend on treating and preventing heart disease
would be to put money into helping people to stop smoking. She points out
that smoking is highly addictive and difficult to quit using will power
alone.

She says: “The good news for the government is that providing specialist
services to help people stop smoking is very cost effective compared with
with prescribing drugs, known as statins, to help lower cholesterol. And
smokers who quit halve their risks of heart attacks.

Source: The Express, 31 October 2002



Japan resists EU label ban

Japan is understood to be considering an appeal to the World Trade
Organisation over European Union proposals to ban the use [misleading] terms
such as “light” and “mild”. Japan Tobacco International (JTI), the worlds
third biggest tobacco company has so far been unable to derail the EU
directive on labelling which would effectively ban its Mild Seven – the
world second biggest cigarette brand – from the EU.

Now the government of Japan, which owns two-thirds of JTI, is apparently
stepping up pressure by telling EU officials it will invoke the WTO disputes
procedure because the EU directive would impose a ‘technical barrier to
trade’.

A WTO official said that no official complaint had yet been received under
the WTO complaints procedure.

Source: Marketing Week, 31 October 2002



Imperial condemns Bill...
...(William remains unimpressed)

In what appears to be a case of sour grapes, Liz Buckingham of Imperial
Tobacco flogs a dead horse one last time by pouring scorn over the Tobacco
Advertising and Promotion Bill which is set to become law in the next few
weeks. She said: “We do not believe banning tobacco advertising and
preventing us from talking on a one to one basis with our adult consumers
will achieve the government’s aims of reducing cigarette consumption.”

Source: Nottingham Evening Post, 23 October 2002



Did Customs really raise limits?

Whilst the nations x-channel shoppers, booze cruisers and bootleggers
rejoice in what many claim as a ‘victory’, it is dawning on some that not
all that much has changed.

Keith Waterhouse, writing for the Daily Mail observes: “The limit on the
quantity of tobacco that travellers may bring in for their own use is to be
greatly increased. But put those words ‘limit’ and ‘increased’ in inverted
commas, for their never was a limit – so what does not exist can hardly be
increased.”

Source: Daily Mail, 31 October 2002

In what must be a very unwelcome honour for the residents, The Tobacco
Manufacturers Association has bestowed upon Doncaster the dubious title of
being the tobacco-smuggling capital of Britain.

Source: The Mirror, 31 October



----------------------------------
Unsubscribe:

Public subscribers: http://www.ash.org.uk/html/about/subscribe.php

Globalink members: http://member.globalink.org
----------------------------------


Naj Dehlavi
Action on Smoking and Health
102 Clifton Street
London EC2A 4HW
http://www.ash.org.uk