Jump to full article: Reuters, 2002-05-31
Author: Will Hardie
Intro: Three years ago as air raid sirens wailed and NATO jets roared overhead, hundreds of Belgrade residents would queue six abreast on city centre streets--braving bombs for a box of sanctions-busting cigarettes.
Such is the Balkan passion for tobacco.
"Each guy would snatch a carton and cradle it like a baby," recalls Petar Borovic, a doctor and veteran anti-smoking campaigner. "It didn't matter to him that it was pouring with rain and the bombs were coming: he was happy and serene."
That compulsion is a dream come true for global tobacco giants now eyeing the region, where tobacco control is a low priority in the struggle for growth and stability, as in post-communist eastern Europe a decade ago.
It is a nightmare for doctors and especially police, because a decade of wars, sanctions, chaos and corruption have turned the Balkans into a hugely lucrative cigarette smuggling centre.
On Friday, World Health Organisation (WHO) No Tobacco Day, more smoke will be rising from the Balkans than from most other places on earth.
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