The chain-smoking Queen Margrethe of Denmark, who has been cruelly dubbed the "Ashtray Queen", has decided to stop smoking in public.

The move has disappointed those Danes who saw the 66-year-old monarch as one of the last bastions against so called political correctness. But with the new law banning smoking in public buildings, the Queen had little choice.

"You will not see the Queen smoking in public any more," Lis Frederiksen, the Danish court spokeswoman, said.