EU appoints tobacco lobbyist to top ethics panel

EUObserver reported that the European Commission attracted criticism in December 2012 for reappointing a tobbaco lobbyist to its Ethics committee on lobbying.

It gave the job to Michel Petite - a French lawyer at the London-based firm Clifford Chance, who works for US tobacco giant Philip Morris - and who previously had been a senior European Commission official.

As part of the three-man ethics panel, he would advise the European Commission if it was OK for former Commissioners to join private companies in the same sector as their old portfolios.

Petite already sat on the committee from 2009 to 2012.

ESO: Background information: Tobacco firms held quiet meetings with top EU officials http://www.europeansources.info/record/tobacco-firms-held-quiet-meetings-with-top-eu-officials/

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