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News - Science: Smokers-only cafes have campaigners fuming.
Japan has banned smoking from most public places, including many city streets, but one company has given refuge to the dwindling ranks of tobacco addicts - by opening smokers-only cafes.
Thick cigarette smoke wafts through the 'Cafe Tobacco' shops in the heart of Tokyo, filled with office workers and shoppers looking to take a quick puff, a habit increasingly frowned upon in a country long seen as a smokers' paradise.
AFP: Turkey extends smoking ban to bars, cafes.
Turkey went smoke-free on Sunday as the government introduced a ban in bars, cafes and restaurants -- despite business owners' protests -- in a bid to break the national addiction to nicotine.
Strongly supported by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a tobacco hater, the smoking ban came into effect at midnight as ashtrays were removed from tables inside these establishments and smokers stepped outside for a puff.
The Peninsula On-line: Qatar's leading English Daily .
The Ottoman sultan Murat IV used to stalk the streets of Istanbul in the 17th century ordering summary executions of smokers, who were then viewed as immoral, un-Islamic and potentially seditious.
Hard-smoking Turks face another ban, this time on lighting up indoors in cafés and restaurants, expected to be pursued with equal vigour, although less drastic penalties, by Recep Tayyip Erdogan, their ascetic prime minister.
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