[Intl-tobacco] Antismokers submit petition protesting govt's backtrack (fwd)

[Robert Weissman]

Antismokers submit petition protesting govt's backtrack
Source:  Yomiuri Shimbun., Saturday, 2/26/00

An antismoking group has handed over a petition with 120,000 signatures
protesting a Health and Welfare Ministry panel's withdrawal of a policy to
halve the number of smokers by 2010.

The Japan Nonsmoking Friendship Association, based in Ina, Nagano
Prefecture, started its signature drive early this month as
tobacco-related industries and some Liberal Democratic Party members
heated up their opposition to the ministry's numerical target.

The association said it took only 10 days to collect the 120,000
signatures in Nagano and other prefectures, more than twice the number
collected by the tobacco-related industry to oppose the target.

The association has 47,000 members nationwide.

At a press conference Thursday, Bungaku Watanabe, chief editor of monthly
Nonsmoking Journal, said, "I desperately wanted the ministry not to give
in to the tobacco industry's pressure and to achieve its original target."

A high-ranking ministry official said, "Although we can not change our
decision (to withdraw the target), we would like to tackle the issue since
we and the association have a common goal to reduce the country's smoking
rate."

The ministry panel's initial numerical target had been the most ambitious
feature of its proposed health improvement plan because Japan's smoking
rate is remarkably high among industrialized nations.