MEPs demand urgent probe into EU trade officials’ ties to tobacco industry

Members of the European Parliament have called on the European Commission to “urgently” investigate exchanges between DG TRADE officials and representatives of the tobacco industry, and to report its findings.

The request was made through an amendment to a parliamentary resolution accompanying the EU Parliament’s approval of the Commission’s management of the 2024 EU budget.

It comes after an investigation by anti-tobacco NGOs in late 2025 revealed, among other things, that tobacco giant Philip Morris International (PMI) had asked DG TRADE to exert pressure on certain third countries, such as Turkey and Mexico, over health regulations framed as barriers to international trade and, therefore, to trade agreements.

According to watchdog groups STOP and Contre-Feu, PMI also provided EU officials with questions to raise during a meeting of the World Trade Organization and requested that the issue be addressed in a report assessing Turkey’s progress towards EU accession.

In addition, several unregistered meetings between industry representatives and DG TRADE are said to have taken place. Between 2023 and 2024, at least eight meetings were reportedly not declared.

“The amendment adopted today recalls that, as a party to the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), the EU must protect public policies from the commercial and other interests of the tobacco industry,” the NGO Contre-Feu said.

Beyond the Commission, the S&D, Renew, Greens/EFA and The Left groups are also currently pushing to tighten the rules governing meetings between elected representatives and industry actors within Parliament.

In February, MEPs Tilly Metz (Greens/EFA, Luxembourg) and Nicolás González Casares (S&D, Spain) sent a letter to Parliament President Roberta Metsola calling for the full implementation of Article 5.3 of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control.

This provision requires that contacts with the tobacco industry be limited to what is strictly necessary, that such interactions be fully transparent, that any form of partnership or cooperation be avoided and that conflicts of interest be prevented.

On 7 April, Metsola replied that responsibility lay with Parliament’s Committee on Constitutional Affairs (AFCO). She indicated that any amendment seeking to introduce additional conditions or restrictions governing interactions between MEPs and representatives of the tobacco industry would require a revision of Parliament’s rules of procedure.

Six days later, 13 MEPs sent a letter to AFCO Chair Sven Simon (EPP, Germany), calling for a review of the procedures governing interactions with industry.

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