Tobacco.org

• Smoking Lawsuit Suspended Indefinitely 

The judge in a groundbreaking trial in which a pensioner is suing a local tobacco company for damages has said that the court requires additional medical expertise, postponing the trial indefinitely.

Ivan Prokopenko, 64, is suing Petro, a local cigarette factory owned by multinational Japan Tobacco International, for 2 million rubles ($71,500). Prokopenko says that he got cancer by smoking Petro's Belomorkanal unfiltered cigarettes for 40 years.

Although Prokopenko and Petro have called medical experts in the case, Judge Tatyana Ilichyova said on Friday that more research was needed to "resolve contradictions in the opinions of the specialists representing both sides."

She concluded the hearing by reading a list of questions compiled from separate lists submitted by both sides, which will be posed to medical experts at the St. Petersburg Bureau for Forensic Expertise to be considered in the next hearing. The bureau is often consulted by courts for independent advice.

The questions concern to what extent Prokopenko's illness was the result of smoking, and of smoking Petro cigarettes in particular; whether there is a connection between Prokopenko's cancer and his former working conditions - which included 10 years in the smelting department of machinery and metal factory Kirovsky Zavod; and to what extent the local environment and Prokopenko's age could also be factors.

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• Local Pensioner Suing Cigarette Company 

A St. Petersburg pensioner is claiming damages of $71,500 from local cigarette producer Petro, in the first law suit against a tobacco company to be heard in a Russian court.

Ivan Prokopenko, represented by the city-based law firm OSV, is demanding compensation for the cancer which resulted in the removal of one of his lungs. Prokopenko says that the cancer, diagnosed two years ago, was the result of smoking Belomorkanal, a non-filtered papirosa cigarette, made by Petro.

Petro is owned by multinational tobacco corporation Japan Tobacco International (JTI). It also produces the Winston, Camel, Russky Stil and Peter I brands.

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