EU moves closer to joining illegal trade protocol

The European Commission decided last week to recommend that the EU should join an international agreement it believes is set one day to become the key multilateral instrument in the fight against the illegal trade in tobacco products, according to an EU press note.

The proposal is that the Council, with the consent of the European Parliament and on behalf of the EU, concludes the Protocol to Eliminate Illicit Trade in Tobacco Products under the World Health Organization’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC Protocol).

Then, all member states would either ratify or accede to the FCTC Protocol to become parties.

Once this process was over, the FCTC Protocol would have 29 EU signatories.

It needs to be ratified by 40 signatories to enter into force.

So far, the FCTC Protocol, which was agreed in 2012, has seven parties (Austria, Gabon, Mongolia, Nicaragua, Spain, Turkmenistan and Uruguay).

The EU signed the FCTC Protocol on 20 December 2013, which is the first step towards the EU becoming a party to the agreement.