{"id":3331,"date":"2015-06-11T20:10:44","date_gmt":"2015-06-11T20:10:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/?p=3331"},"modified":"2015-06-11T20:10:44","modified_gmt":"2015-06-11T20:10:44","slug":"ukraine-bails-on-ridiculous-challenge-to-australian-plain-packaging-laws","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/?p=3331","title":{"rendered":"Ukraine bails on ridiculous challenge to Australian plain packaging laws"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"342903-cigarette-packs\"<\/a>
Plain packaging<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Here is an update<\/a> on John Oliver’s excellent rant<\/a> about the tactics of Big Tobacco in fighting regulations against their products worldwide.<\/p>\n

This is complicated and I’m not 100 percent confident I will explain it right, but I will try:<\/p>\n

Ukraine had been convinced (no doubt by Big Tobacco lobbying efforts) to file a World Trade Organization\u00a0challenge\u00a0against Australia over Australia’s plain packaging laws. Per Australian law, tobacco companies\u00a0cannot put their logos on cigarette packs. Only graphic anti-smoking warnings are allowed and a small amount of text saying what the actual brand of the cigarettes are.<\/p>\n

Tobacco companies filed suit and recently, the Australian Supreme Court ruled in favour of the government. So, Big Tobacco (or should I say Big World Tobacco) lost that round.<\/p>\n

\"ukraine-wheat-fields\"<\/a>
They grow wheat in Ukraine, not tobacco<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

However, Big World Tobacco also went the WTO route (John Oliver did a great piece on this), saying Australia’s strict rules affected trade with other countries and violated international trade agreements. For some mystifying reason, Ukraine got involved, even though Ukraine is not a major tobacco-growing nation and does not export any tobacco to Australia. (Like I said, I smell money — LOTS of money — exchanging hands here between tobacco interests and Ukrainian government officials.)<\/p>\n

From the Reuters article:<\/a><\/p>\n

Health campaigners were perplexed by Ukraine’s WTO suit because it is also a party to the U.N.’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control and was one of the countries that backed guidelines on how to implement the treaty, including enforcing plain packaging.<\/p>\n

British American Tobacco has previously said it was helping meet Ukraine’s legal costs in the WTO case against Australia. Individual companies cannot pursue litigation via the WTO.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Well, there you go: BAT was paying Ukraine’s legal fees.<\/p>\n

The issue isn’t over, but Ukraine was the biggest country involved in fighting the Australian plain packaging rules. Other nations challenging the plain packaging rules are Cuba, Honduras, Indonesia and the Dominican Republic (all tobacco-growing nations).<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Here is an update on John Oliver’s excellent rant about the tactics of Big Tobacco in fighting regulations against their products worldwide. This is complicated and I’m not 100 percent confident I will explain it right, but I will try: Ukraine had been convinced (no doubt by Big Tobacco lobbying efforts) to file a World … Continue reading Ukraine bails on ridiculous challenge to Australian plain packaging laws<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3332,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[8,301,445,533,447,532],"tags":[583,448,534,535],"class_list":["post-3331","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-australia","category-cigarette-labels","category-john-oliver","category-ukraine","category-world-tobacco-use","category-world-trade-organization","tag-australia","tag-john-oliver","tag-ukraine","tag-wto"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/342903-cigarette-packs.jpg?fit=500%2C500&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4hpEa-RJ","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":4036,"url":"https:\/\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/?p=4036","url_meta":{"origin":3331,"position":0},"title":"World Trade Organization rules in favour of Australia’s plain packaging laws for tobacco","author":"Pepe Lepew","date":"May 6, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Big Tobacco simply won't quit. 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Australia kicks international Big Tobacco’s butt … again","author":"Pepe Lepew","date":"December 20, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Yet another major legal victory for Australia in its long-running battle against Big Tobacco. Specifically, Australia defeated Philip Morris International, which has been one of the corporations fighting Australia for the past five to 10 years over that nation's plain-packaging laws. Initially, the government of Australia won in the Australian\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Australia"","block_context":{"text":"Australia","link":"https:\/\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/?cat=8"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/AustralianFlag.jpg?fit=1200%2C991&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/AustralianFlag.jpg?fit=1200%2C991&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/AustralianFlag.jpg?fit=1200%2C991&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/AustralianFlag.jpg?fit=1200%2C991&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/AustralianFlag.jpg?fit=1200%2C991&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":2961,"url":"https:\/\/pepesnonsmokingpartytimelounge.com\/?p=2961","url_meta":{"origin":3331,"position":3},"title":"And speaking of John Oliver — Ireland fights back against tobacco industry over plain packaging","author":"Pepe Lepew","date":"February 21, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"A big focus of John Oliver's piece on the tobacco industry was how huge tobacco companies are fighting small nations trying to impose plain packaging laws for cigarettes. 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