Category: Uncategorized

INTIMIDATION TACTICS. "Uruguay ... planned to back down until Mayor Michael Bloomberg offered to pay their legal defense fees. Among other things, this case is aimed at discouraging other countries from moving forward with similar regulations." https://lnkd.in/d5WRu9r View in LinkedIn

INTIMIDATION TACTICS. "Philip Morris is currently suing Uruguay through a bilateral investment treaty between Uruguay and Switzerland. Uruguay ... has an annual GDP less than half of Phillip Morris’s annual sales." https://lnkd.in/d5WRu9r View in LinkedIn

PRIVATE COMPANIES SUING GOVERNMENTS. "Tobacco companies began using trade and investment agreements to file legal challenges to block new cigarette labeling and advertising restrictions. Australia is fighting four different trade and investment cases against its cigarette packaging law (etc)." https://lnkd.in/dDpdMVf View in LinkedIn

WEAPON OF TRADE LITIGATION. "The tobacco industry need not win trade disputes to achieve their goal. The cost of litigation is a barrier unto itself, and many governments simply cannot afford to win these disputes ... even wealthy countries, have delayed or discarded plans to advance tobacco control legislation due to the threat of trade litigation." https://lnkd.in/dtMxZcK View in LinkedIn

TOBACCO COAT-TAILING FREE TRADE TALKS. "The tobacco industry has consistently abused international trade and investment rules to stall, block or roll-back implementation of the tobacco treaty. Trade is the strongest arrow in their litigation quiver, and TTIP as it is currently envisioned is a dream come true." https://lnkd.in/dtMxZcK View in LinkedIn

LOBBIES OVERTURNING PUBLIC HEALTH POLICY. "Trade bodies can overturn domestic public health and safety policies, in 2011 the WTO ruled against aspects of the U.S. ban against the sale of candy- and other sweet-flavored cigarettes (which often attract children to smoking) contained in the U.S. Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act of 2009." https://lnkd.in/dZRfg_S View in LinkedIn

LAWSUITS AGAINST GOVERNMENTS. "TTIP (Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership) ... raises the prospect of Big Tobacco and other corporations bringing legal actions against governments that prioritise the health of their citizens over the profits of these companies." https://lnkd.in/dsTub_g View in LinkedIn

THE MODERN CIGARETTE is different. But quite how different is the issue. Engineered free base nicotine is comparable in addiction to illegal drugs today. These changes in tobacco have not needed to be disclosed, because it is unregulated, but they represent a remarkable change in the landscape. View in LinkedIn

A SUPERB ARTICLE on iridescence, coving the subject in sufficient technical detail for all of us to grasp and illustrating the lovely possibilities of learning from nature to create man-made new materials and effects. https://lnkd.in/d3_ruXz View in LinkedIn

SEE INFOGRAPHIC on TTIP. "As I am typing this, I am becoming more and more aware of how fantastical and exaggerated the potential implications of the TTIP could come across. It all sounds like the plot to a Marvel super-villain comic. In fact, this is probably one of the agreements best tools – it seems too crazy to be true. But this is reality." https://lnkd.in/d3KpSH4 View in LinkedIn