Tobacco Industry's Interest In Trade Negotiations? Totally Redacted

from the public-interest? dept

The folks at Corporate Europe Observatory (CEO) sent a freedom of information request to the EU Commission, asking for details of meetings that trade officials held with the tobacco industry. This matters, because the tobacco industry is one of the major abusers of trade agreements, repeatedly making use of the "corporate sovereignty" ISDS provisions to effectively sue any country passing anti-smoking health laws -- as was covered a few months back by John Oliver: So, as new trade agreements are being negotiated -- especially since the powers that be tell us these agreements are designed to protect the health and well being of the public -- it seems that Big Tobacco's efforts in these negotiations is pretty relevant. After numerous delays and confusing responses, CEO finally received a response. And it's [redacted]. Well, not entirely, but basically anything useful is blacked out. Such as this lovely document, which is oh so revealing: Democracy in action!

Filed Under: corporate sovereignty, isds, redacted, tafta, tobacco, trade deals, transparency, ttip
Companies: ceo, philip morris