Brussels Break-Ins Investigated as \'Tobaccogate\' Unfolds

John Dalli, who has resigned as E.U. health commissioner, denied wrongdoing on Wednesday.

LONDON - The police in Belgium are investigating break-ins at the offices of three antismoking lobby groups in a central Brussels building, in which thieves stole material related to their campaigns against the tobacco industry.

The burglaries took place early on Thursday morning, less than two days after the abrupt resignation of John Dalli, the European Union's health commissioner, in the wake of a corruption investigation.

Mr. Dalli, who says he is innocent of any wrongdoing, was responsible for shepherding through proposed tougher rules on European tobacco sales. In a setback for antismoking campaigners, the departure of the Maltese commissioner means action on a new tobacco directive has been shelved, potentially for two years.

And in the latest development in an affair that has predictably been dubbed “tobaccogate,” a Swed ish producer of snus, the local mouth tobacco, said on Friday that it had been asked for a "60 million, or $78 million, bribe to arrange for the lifting of a European ban on the product outside Sweden.

The health N.G.O.'s targeted in the Thursday break-ins have not made a direct link with the bribery investigation in statements on the burglaries.

The European Respiratory Society, one of the three, said: “We do not subscribe to conspiracy theories. However, in light of the evidence we feel we have legitimate reason to suspect the intrusion was well-planned, researched and targeted.”

Antismoking campaigners believe the break-ins and the Dalli affair are linked to an alleged dirty tricks campaign by big tobacco to delay further curbs on the industry.

“For me, it's 100 percent industry-commissioned,” Luk Joossens, a Belgian expert at a cancer-prevention organization, told EUobserver in reaction to the break-ins.

The corruption probe was laun ched by OLAF, the European Union's antifraud unit, after Swedish Match, the snus producer, reported that it had been approached by a Maltese businessman demanding a bribe in exchange for using his influence with Mr. Dalli, his fellow Maltese, to lift the ban on its product.

“The Maltese businessman expressed to us very clearly that he was speaking on behalf of Dalli. He had a manner and information that made us wary,” Patrik Hildingsson, a Swedish Match spokesman, told Reuters on Friday.

Swedish Match has a joint venture with Philip Morris International to develop new snus markets.

On Wednesday, Silvio Zammit, a Maltese entrepreneur and circus owner, resigned his post as deputy mayor of Sliema, Malta, after local media reports linked him to the alleged bribery attempt.

“I strongly deny all allegations of any wrongdoing on my part,” he said in a statement on his Facebook page.

“I categorically state that I have never received any payme nt from the Swedish company Swedish Match or ESTOC, the European Smokeless Tobacco Council. My role was that of a lobbyist and all my contribution in the matter was above board and regular,” Mr. Zammit said.

Mr. Dalli has been similarly forthright in his own defense. “As I have told OLAF before, I don't know anything of this offer, and neither did I know what was going on between these parties. This is news to me,” he told Malta Today on Friday.

The fraud unit, which has passed its findings to the Maltese authorities, itself acknowledged that it had found no conclusive evidence that Mr. Dalli had directly participated in requesting money.

However, it concluded: “There are a number of unambiguous circumstantial pieces of evidence” indicating that “Commissioner Dalli was aware of the activities of the Maltese entrepreneur and of the fact that this person was using the Commissioner's name and position to gain financial advantages.”

Mr. Dall i, who claims he was himself a target of the tobacco lobby, said this week that José Manuel Barroso, the European Commission president, had forced him to quit. He was intent on clearing his name, he said.

He said his planned Europe-wide directive would have been aimed at making tobacco products less attractive by introducing bigger health warnings on cigarette packets and removing flavoring from some lines that are popular with young women smokers.

He said there was never any question of easing the European ban on snus, which is only available in Sweden as a consequence of an E.U. exemption granted to the Swedes.

Mr. Dalli's new antitobacco rules are now on hold, at least until a successor is appointed and possibly until after European Parliament elections in 2014.

But “tobaccogate” is likely to rumble on. As Nils Wadstrom, a Swedish journalist, posted on Twitter: