(CNN) The world's biggest international tobacco company has come under fire for a "hypocritical" campaign encouraging people to give up cigarettes.

Philip Morris -- which produces Marlboro cigarettes among other brands -- launched its "Hold My Light" push in the UK on Monday, urging smokers to switch to vaping or heated tobacco products instead.

But anti-smoking campaigners attacked the company, which also owns e-cigarette brands, saying it is "jumping on the bandwagon" of declining smoking rates in the UK while still selling cigarettes around the world.

"It's not that the message is the wrong one -- it's that it's hypocritical for a company that is still promoting smoking in most parts of the world to be saying that it's turned over a new leaf," Deborah Arnott, Chief Executive of charity Action on Smoking and Health (ASH), told CNN.

"They're basically hanging on the coattails of government anti-smoking regulation that has worked, and they're trying to get some kind of benefit for them from it," she added. "They're looking for a commercial advantage, make no mistake."