As had been expected, the European Court of Justice (ECJ) has upheld an EU ban on Swedish snus.
Swedish snus is banned in all EU countries except Sweden.
The ECJ’s ruling came in response to a challenge brought by Swedish Match (SM) against the validity of the snus ban under EU law. The challenge was originally brought in the UK and was referred by the High Court there to the ECJ.
In a note posted on its website on November 22, SM said that the ECJ had published its judgment ‘concerning the prohibition to sell Swedish snus to other European Union member states’. ‘The court rules that Swedish snus will continue to be excluded from the EU’s internal market,’ it said.
‘In its judgement the court states that EU legislature has broad discretion within the area at issue and that this implies that judicial review is limited. These limitations apply both to measures decided by the EU legislature and to the basic facts on which these measures have been based. Based on such limited review the court does not find that the ban on snus is manifestly inappropriate.
‘The judgment of the ECJ cannot be appealed which leaves a future removal of the ban essentially a political issue.’
The use of snus is far safer than smoking cigarettes, and snus does not come with the environmentally-damaging filters that cigarettes include. And snus has proved to be an acceptable alternative for many smokers.
Snus ban stands
