Call for Support of International Civil Society Declaration Against ACTA (Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement)

[Robin Gross]

Dear Friends,

As you are probably aware, the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement  
(ACTA) is a dangerous proposal to radically expand intellectual  
property rights at the global level.  The draft agreement has been  
negotiated in secret, without inclusion of developing nation  
perspectives, and without any participation from civil society or  
regard for the global public interest.  ACTA specifically targets the  
Internet and regulates the flow of information in a digital  
environment.  ACTA would create significant negative consequences for  
fundamental freedoms, access to medicines, innovation, the balance of  
public/private interests, access to knowledge and culture, to name a  
few of its problems.  ACTA represents a "wish list" from Hollywood  
and Big Pharma which will be imposed unilaterally on developing  
countries through trade pressure from the US, Europe and other  
wealthy states.

Please consider signing on to the below (draft) International Civil  
Society Declaration, which was the result of a meeting in Washington,  
DC this week of over 90 academics from 5 continents, public interest  
organizations and other legal experts concerned with the public  
interest aspects of ACTA.  The meeting of international experts was  
hosted by American University Washington College of Law Program on  
Information Justice and Intellectual Property (PIJIP).

Both organizations and individuals are welcome to sign-on to the  
statement until 23 June 9am (US East Coast time) by email to <  
acta.declaration at gmail.com >.

Further details for sign-on and proposing edits to the draft  
declaration are below.  Please take a moment and read the declaration  
and consider signing-on and adding your support to raise awareness on  
ACTA.  And also please help to spread the word and gather additional  
civil society support from your own networks and contacts by  
forwarding this email on to others or reference to the website:  
http://www.wcl.american.edu/pijip/go/blog-post/urgent-acta-communique  
for details.

The next closed-door ACTA negotiations are scheduled for 28 June - 2  
July 2010 in Lucerne, Switzerland, and the US promises a final  
agreement will be concluded shortly thereafter.  Time is of the  
essence to act on ACTA.

Thank you for any support and assistance you can provide to raise  
awareness on the public interest concerns with ACTA.  It is only  
through global grass-roots efforts and small individual actions made  
by many people that we can fight to overcome this flawed treaty.

All best,
Robin Gross

Begin forwarded message:

> From: "Sean Flynn" <sflynn at wcl.american.edu>
> Date: June 19, 2010 10:30:38 AM PDT
> To: "Robin Gross" <robin at ipjustice.org>
> Subject: acta communique
> The DRAFT statement below reflects the conclusions reached at a  
> meeting of over 90 academics, practitioners and public interest  
> organizations from five continents gathered at American University  
> Washington College of Law, June 16-18, 2010. The statement is now  
> open to endorsements.
>
> The latest version of the draft communiqué is now posted to a  
> public blog post at:
>
> http://wcl.american.edu/pijip/go/acta-communique
>
> Please share the draft with others, circulate on your blogs, etc.
>
> THIS DRAFT STATEMENT IS NOW OPEN FOR INDIVIDUAL AND ORGANIZATIONAL  
> ENDORSEMENTS AS WELL AS EDITING COMMENTS.
> •             Please send signatures to: acta.declaration at gmail.com
> •             Please send edits to: pijip at wcl.american.edu
>
> EDITING SUGGESTIONS
> WILL BE ACCEPTED UNTIL NOON MONDAY JUNE 21. THE FINAL TEXT WITH  
> EDITS INCLUDED WILL BE RELEASED BY 5PM MONDAY JUNE 21.
>
> THE FINAL STATEMENT WILL BE RELEASED TO THE PUBLIC WITH  
> ENDORSEMENTS ON WEDNESDAY JUNE 23 AT 10AM. ENDORSEMENTS WILL BE  
> ACCEPTED UNTIL JUNE 23 AT 9AM.
>
> ENDORSEMENTS:
> WE WILL ACCEPT PROVISIONAL ENDORSEMENTS NOW. ENDORSERS WILL BE  
> GIVEN THE OPTION TO OPT-OUT WHEN THE FINAL TEXT IS CIRCULATED BY  
> 5PM MONDAY JUNE 21.
>
> FOR INDIVIDUAL ENDORSEMENTS, SEND YOUR NAME, TITLE AND ORGANIZATION  
> AND PLACE (CITY, COUNTRY) OF OCCUPATION to acta.declaration at gmail.com
>
> FOR ORGANIZATIONAL ENDORSEMENTS, ENTER THE NAME OF THE ORGANIZATION  
> AND PLACE(S) (CITY(IES), COUNTRY(IES))  IN WHICH THE ORGANIZATION  
> HAS OFFICES to acta.declaration at gmail.com.
>
> INDIVIDUALS WITHIN SIGNATORY ORGANIZATIONS MAY ENDORSE AS  
> INDIVIDUALS AS WELL AS BEING PART OF THE ORGANIZATIONAL ENDORSEMENT.
>
> PLEASE CIRCULATE WIDELY.
>
>
> DRAFT Urgent Communique: Consultation of International Experts on  
> ACTA and the Public Interest
>
> Release Date: June 23, 2010
>
> American University Washington College of Law
>
> Washington, D.C.
>
> http://wcl.american.edu/pijip/go/acta-communique
> International Experts Find that Pending Anti-Counterfeiting Trade  
> Agreement Threatens Public Interests
>
> We find that the terms of the agreement threaten numerous public  
> interests, including nearly every concern specifically disclaimed  
> by the negotiators in their announcement.
>
> The proposed agreement is a deeply flawed product of a deeply  
> flawed process.
>
> What started as a proposal to coordinate customs enforcement  
> offices has morphed into a massive new international intellectual  
> property (IP) and internet regulation with grave consequences for  
> the global economy and governments' ability to promote and protect  
> public interests.
>
> Any agreement of this scope and consequence must be based on a  
> broad and consultative process and reflect a full range of public  
> interest concerns. As detailed below, this text fails to meet these  
> standards.
>
> Recognizing that the terms of the agreement are under negotiation,  
> a fair reading of the proposed text as a whole leads to our  
> conclusions that ACTA:
>
> THE INTERNET
> -Encourages internet service providers to police users of the  
> internet without adequate court oversight or due process;
>
> -Globalizes 'anti-circumvention' provisions which threaten  
> innovation, competition, open source business models,  
> interoperability, copyright exceptions, and user choice;
>
> FREE TRADE AND ACCESS TO MEDICINES
> -Disrupts the free trade in legitimate generic medicines and other  
> goods, and sacrifices the foundational principle that IP rights are  
> territorial, by requiring customs authorities to seize goods in  
> transit countries even when they do not violate any law of the  
> producing and importing countries;
>
> -Does little or nothing to address the problem of medicines with  
> insufficient or wrong ingredients as the majority of these are not  
> IP but regulatory system problems.
> -Extends the powers of custom officials to search and seize a wide  
> range of goods, including computers and other electronic devices,  
> without adequate safeguards against unwarranted confiscations and  
> privacy invasions;
>
> -Extends 'ex officio' border search and seizures from willful,  
> commercial scale trademark counterfeiting to a broad range of  
> intellectual property infringements, including “confusingly  
> similar” trademark violations, copyright infringement standards  
> that require interpretation of "fair use" or similar user rights,  
> and even to patent cases which frequently involve complex questions  
> of law and fact that are difficult to adjudicate even by specialist  
> courts after full adjudicative processes;
>
> FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS AND FREEDOMS
> -Will curtail full enjoyment of fundamental rights and liberties,  
> including rights to privacy and the protection of personal data,  
> health, access to information, free expression, due process and  
> presumptions of innocence, cultural participation, and other  
> internationally protected human rights;
>
> SCOPE AND NATURE OF IP LAW
> Distorts the balance fundamental to IP law between the rights and  
> interests of proprietors and users, including by
> introducing very specific rights and remedies for rights holders  
> without correlative requirements to provide exceptions,  
> limitations, and due process safeguards for users;
> shifting enforcement from private civil mechanisms to public  
> authorities and third parties, including to customs officials,  
> criminal prosecutors and internet service providers -- in ways that  
> are likely to be more sensitive to proprietary concerns and less  
> sensitive to user concerns;
> omitting liability and disincentives for abuses of enforcement  
> processes by right holders; and
> requiring the adoption of automatic damages assessments unrelated  
> to any proven harm;
> -Alters the traditional and constitutionally mandated law making  
> processes for IP by:
> locking in and exporting controversial aspects of US and EU  
> enforcement practices whcih have already proven problematic,  
> foreclosing future legislative improvements in response to changes  
> in technology or policy;
> requiring substantive changes to intellectual property laws of a  
> large number of negotiating countries.
> INTERNATIONAL TRADE AND DEVELOPMENT
> -Will disproportionately harm development and social welfare of the  
> poor, particularly in developing countries, including through  
> raising unjustifiable trade barriers to imports and exports of  
> needed medicines and other knowledge embedded goods;
>
> -Contains provisions inconsistent with the WTO Agreement on Trade  
> Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS Agreement);
>
> -Conflicts with the World Trade Organization Doha Declaration on  
> TRIPS and Public Health and World Health Assembly Resolution 61.21  
> by limiting the ability of countries to exercise to the full  
> flexibilities in the TRIPS agreement that can promote access to  
> needed medicines;
>
> -Circumvents and undermines the commitments agreed to under the  
> World Intellectual Property Organization development agenda,  
> particularly recommendation 45 committing to “approach intellectual  
> property enforcement in the context of broader societal interests  
> and especially development-oriented concerns," and "in accordance  
> with Article 7 of the TRIPS Agreement";
>
> INSTITUTIONAL ISSUES
> -Creates a new and redundant international administration for IP  
> issues outside of WIPO or the WTO with broad powers but limited  
> transparency, threatening multilateralism in international IP norm  
> setting;
>
> -Encourages technical assistance, public awareness campaigns, and  
> partnerships with the private sector that appear designed to  
> promote only the interests of IP owners;
>
> CONCLUSIONS ABOUT THE DEMOCRATIC PROCESS
> The current process for considering public input into ACTA is  
> fundamentally flawed in numerous respects. In many countries, the  
> only consultations taking place are with select members of the  
> public, off-the-record and without benefit of sharing the latest  
> version of the rapidly changing text. There is little possibility  
> that a fair and balanced agreement that protects and promotes  
> public interests can evolve from such a distorted policy making  
> process.
>
> Governments, right holders and civil society should have an open  
> and evidence-based discussion on the right strategy to confront  
> willful commercial scale trademark counterfeiting and commercial  
> scale copyright piracy. This discussion should take place in  
> multilateral and national open and on-the-record forums with access  
> to current negotiating text so that all interested stakeholders can  
> participate.
>
> ENDORSEMENTS
>
> Please send signatures (individual or Organization, City, Country)  
> to: acta.declaration at gmail.com
> Please send edits to: pijip at wcl.american.edu
>
>
> Sean Flynn
> Associate Director
> Program on Information Justice and Intellectual Property
> American University Washington College of Law
> 202 274 4157
> www.pijip.org
>




IP JUSTICE
Robin Gross, Executive Director
1192 Haight Street, San Francisco, CA  94117  USA
p: +1-415-553-6261    f: +1-415-462-6451
w: http://www.ipjustice.org     e: robin at ipjustice.org

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