Global Anti-Tobacco Treaty Takes Effect
> Tobacco companies reportedly lobbied against the treaty during
> negotiations but have since said they have no objection to the pact —
> despite their discontent over being excluded from the formal treaty talks.
– Well, why would they? The simile “as weak as a diplomatic protest” was coined to reflect just such ‘treaties’ as this, which are designed mainly to allow activists to puff themselves up (no pun intended) and say they “did something about it.”
> Ratifying countries that fail to enact reforms face no penalties but will
> have their record examined at U.N. anti-tobacco conferences, the first of
> which is set for February 2006.
Oooh, scary…
> “Now that this global treaty has become international law, it is no longer
> business as usual for ‘Big Tobacco,’” said Akinbode Oluwafemi of
> Environmental Rights Action, a Nigerian-based group.
Wanna bet? China, with three billion people who have always smoked like bombs, and the United States, with the biggest ad-marketing engine in the world, did not ratify the ‘treaty.’ At full force, it might drop demand by one to two per cent. Maybe.
Oh, yah, Comrade Oluwafemi, you’ve got the capitalists quivering in their spats now.
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