Europeans huffy over American-inspired smoking bans

ATHENS, Greece - There is the law. And then there is Costas' taxi.

Costas Salatas smokes - cigarette after cigarette of the cheapest Greek brands - in open defiance of rules banning cabbies from lighting up. When the ashtray fills after a few hours, he simply flicks the butts from the window.

"What's next?" he growled as he waved his cigarette like a conductor's baton. "No smoking at cafes? No smoking at the beach? Is this the future in Europe?"

It could be.

From Irish pubs to Turkish teahouses, a barrage of measures have smokers and tobacco companies in the cross hairs. Norway and Ireland appear headed toward American-style smoking bans in restaurants and other public places. Greece and Spain have imposed some controls but tread cautiously with their puffing populace.

The trends, though, are as unmistakable as the Marlboro Man: Europe is shedding its smoker-friendly ambiance. Coming years foresee cigarette-free zones expanding, warning labels growing bigger and tobacco advertising and sponsorship disappearing.

No one promises it will be easy on a continent where even a cheeseburger can inspire debates on cultural imperialism. The efforts to contain smokers collide with the Europeans' self image as tolerant, moderate and, above all, sophisticated. To some critics, uncompromising antismoking laws seem too much of a crass import from across the Atlantic - something the cigarette lobby can capitalize on.

"Europe should be different. It shouldn't blindly copy America's antismoking fervor," said Simon Clark, director of the London lobby group Freedom Organization for the Right to Enjoy Smoking Tobacco.

But the European Union, which will expand from 15 to 25 nations next year, is taking its "feel free to say no" campaign to heart. The European Commission will ban smoking at its headquarters in Brussels and Luxembourg in May and offer courses for employees wishing to quit.

In January, warning labels on EU cigarette packs must grow to 30 percent of the front and 40 percent of the back - a relative billboard compared with the more discreet U.S. warnings. They used to cover a small patch of the pack similar to the U.S. warnings.

The EU might even allow pictures of smoking ailments such as diseased lungs.

In 2005, the EU will outlaw tobacco ads in publications on the Internet and at international sporting events, including the Formula One races that are awash in cigarette sponsorship. F-1 officials are threatening to move races from Europe to Asia and other regions, and they've dropped their race in Belgium, although the Belgian parliament recently eased its tobacco ad ban in a bid to get it back.

"The tide is turning," said the EU's health commissioner, David Byrne, who has spearheaded measures to limit smoking and the influence of tobacco companies.

But it's not the first time. For centuries, Europe has seesawed from being a smokers' paradise and purgatory.

In the 17th century, Pope Urban VIII issued a papal bull against smoking. Russia's Czar Alexis was known to send unrepentant smokers to Siberia. King James I of England, in his famous antitobacco treatise published in 1604, called smoking "a custom loathsome to the eye, hateful to the nose, harmful to the brain, dangerous to the lungs, and in the black, stinking fume thereof, nearest resembling the horrible Stygian smoke of the pit that is bottomless."

Then came the French Revolution in 1789 and cigarettes rolled in plant husks became a symbol of popular dissent against the tobacco snuff favored by blue-bloods. Britain's cigar-loving Edward VII added respectability to smoking after taking the throne in 1901.

Modern tax systems preyed heavily on smokers. Governments were happy: More smokers meant more revenue.

And in current generations, European smokers could hone their identities by the brand they smoked: Gauloises for the francophile; Marlboros or Camels for an American look.

The latest limits have some smokers breathing fire.

"For me a cigarette is a friend, a companion, a lover, a sister, a mother," said Enzo Carlone, a 48-year-old street artist in Rome. A new Italian law, which takes effect in April, mandates no-smoking areas in restaurants.

Pelin Turkoglu, a 23-year-old smoker in Istanbul, Turkey, vowed: "If smoking inside is outlawed then I will continue smoking outside even it is freezing cold." Turkey is under pressure to impose stricter antismoking laws to boost its bid to join the EU.

In Portugal, where no-smoking areas are a novelty, a wave of outrage greeted a failed attempt at an American-inspired class action suit by throat-cancer sufferers against the state and the former tobacco monopoly.

In Dublin, Ireland, grandmother Olive O'Shea puffed away in sight of a "no smoking" sign in a Burger King restaurant.

"When that sign leaps down from the wall and grabs the (cigarette) out of my mouth, maybe then I'll pay attention to the sign," she scoffed.

Ireland might be the next major battleground. On Jan. 1, a smoking ban takes effect in public places, including the hallowed Irish pub. Opponents say the measures - similar to those imposed in New York and other U.S. cities - will lead to mass layoffs and change the pubs' venerable role as the country's social hub.

"It's sheer lunacy," said Gerry Crawford, manager of Ireland's oldest pub, the Brazen Head in Dublin, whose origins reach back more than 800 years.

Smoking rates have been in slow decline across most of Europe, ranging from less than 20 percent in Sweden to more than 60 percent among some groups in Greece, Turkey and Russia. The U.S. average is about 23 percent.

But many Europeans countries also have witnessed a spike in smoking among teens and children.

In France, where studies indicate 40 percent of youths are regular smokers, lawmakers in July banned the sale of cigarettes to people younger than 16 and boosted tobacco taxes that should raise the price of brand-name cigarettes above $4.50 a pack. U.S. prices range from about $3 to $7.50. Spain has passed similar measures.

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