USTR Names New Ambassador To WTO; Ag Negotiator 29/03/2010 by Intellectual Property Watch Leave a Comment Two officials have been appointed to the Office of the United States Trade Representative: Michael Punke as deputy USTR and permanent representative to the World Trade Organization in Geneva, and Isi Siddiqui as the new chief agricultural negotiator.
Leaked ACTA Text Shows Possible Contradictions With National Laws 29/03/2010 by Monika Ermert for Intellectual Property Watch 4 Comments “No changes in domestic” law promised the partners currently negotiating the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement. A leaked 56-page recent consolidated version of the much-discussed agreement shows that this might not be completely true. The draft version with a lot of bracketed text in it shows that some countries are more open about the potential need to change their domestic laws than others.
British Official To Lead UPOV As Civil Society Interest Rises 28/03/2010 by Kaitlin Mara for Intellectual Property Watch Leave a Comment The International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV), an intergovernmental agency that provides technical advice and guidelines for the identification and protection of new plants, will have a new leader for the first time in a decade, it was decided Friday.
Lamy: “Not Where We Wanted To Be” In WTO Round 28/03/2010 by Intellectual Property Watch Leave a Comment World Trade Organization Director General Pascal Lamy on Friday said that there are “technically no insurmountable obstacles” in resolving the long-struggling Doha Round of trade liberalisation talks this year, but that this timeline was always a political rather than technical one. In the so-called WTO stock-taking, regarding the size of the gaps that remain “we […]
Right To Food Mandate Renewed By UN Agency 25/03/2010 by Intellectual Property Watch Leave a Comment The UN Human Rights Council yesterday extended the mandate of the Special Rapporteur on the right to food for three years. The resolution, A/HRC/13/L.17, adopted without a vote, requests that the special rapporteur “continue to monitor the evolution of the world food crisis and to maintain the council informed of the impact of the crisis […]
Google Claims Ads Found Not Infringing Trademarks 23/03/2010 by Intellectual Property Watch 2 Comments The European Court of Justice has ruled that Google did not infringe trademark law “by allowing advertisers to bid for keywords corresponding to their competitors’ trademarks,” according to the Google blog. The internet search engine said it is satisfied with the ruling which, “confirmed that European law that protects internet hosting services applies to Google’s […]
WIPO Sees Decrease In Cybersquatting Complaints, Warns Of Domain Name Expansion 23/03/2010 by Catherine Saez and William New, Intellectual Property Watch Leave a Comment The expansion of internet domain names as proposed is worrying to trademark owners as a significant number cybersquatting cases continue to be filed in the World Intellectual Property Organization dispute resolution system, WIPO said this week. Meanwhile internet intermediaries should play a bigger role in the fight against trademark infringement, WIPO officials said.
Biodiversity Negotiators Seek To Finalise Draft Access, Benefit-Sharing Regime 22/03/2010 by Kaitlin Mara for Intellectual Property Watch 1 Comment Delegates to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity today begin the last formal meeting before a late-2010 deadline to negotiate an agreement ensuring fair and equitable access to and benefits from the world’s scarce biological resources.
EU To Request Publication Of ACTA Documents To Stop “Rumours”; Civil Society Meeting Planned 22/03/2010 by Monika Ermert for Intellectual Property Watch Leave a Comment Europe will request the publication of the current drafts for the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) at the next ACTA negotiating meeting in New Zealand in April, EU trade official Luc Devigne said today. Speaking at the third EU stakeholder meeting on the hotly debated ACTA today in Brussels, Devigne also said there is also a meeting with civil society planned to take place alongside the New Zealand round.
China Tells WTO: Obligations Fulfilled On IP Dispute Case 22/03/2010 by Kaitlin Mara for Intellectual Property Watch 1 Comment China on Friday briefed the World Trade Organization on improvements in its intellectual property rights enforcement needed to bring it into compliance with a dispute settlement decision made last year.