Thursday 5 February 2009

Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA): EU Council work - updated

Next Tuesday (10 February 2009), the EU Council Working Party on Intellectual Property has the controversial Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) on its agenda.

According to the agenda of the meeting, the Civil enforcement chapter and the Internet provisions of this international agreement for a more rigid protection of intellectual property will be presented by the Commission and discussed by the member state representatives.

As usual, these discussions take place behind closed doors, so we will not get any details before everything will have been dealt with by diplomats and bureaucrats.

And by the way: The responsible administrator in the EU Council is Leonidas KARAMOUNTZOS, who seems to working in the field of intellectual property inside the EU institutions for quite some time: If you google his name, you will find documents that show that he is at least 10 years in this field.

I am not sure that such a sensitive area with raising attention should be covered such a long time by the same bureaucrat... it sounds like an invitation for lobbyists!

Update (14 April 2009): The negotiation documents of the ACTA negotiations have been leaked (via Netzpolitik)).

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