WHAT'S ON BRITSKÉ LISTY

MEPs protest: no more secrets around ACTA

21. 7. 2010 / Pavel Poc

If it is true that the negotiators have nothing to hide, then there is no reason for the treaty to not be available to the public. I don't like the fact that not even members of the European Parliament have access to any information regarding the content of the document, even though it exactly the MEPs who will be approving it or not. The European Parliament should be informed of all stages of negotiation, which in reality is not happening.

Even the Vice-President of the European Parliament, Stavros Lambrinidis, is against this confidentiality. "It is not acceptable that the latest version of this document is not available for debate and that it will be available only later, and that behind closed doors. That is why it is not possible for us to have a serious debate over the newest developments around the ACTA treaty."

More than 350 MEPs have taken a stand against this confidentiality these past week, signing a declaration requesting transparency for the whole process. Including me.

The principle itself behind such an agreement with such a global reach is so serious that it has to be under appropriate public control. For it can have a rather fundamental impact on citizens` lives and on the economy. Not even I approve copyrights` piracy and stealing intellectual property. However, it is not possible to accept that such a serious issue will be discussed behind closed doors by some elite club. On top of that, copyright protection was, is and has to continue to be a matter for the independent justice system.

The objective of the so-called ACTA treaty is the fight counterfeiting IP (Intellectual Property) in a global level. For that it has to guarantee an international cooperation among countries in terms of common legal frameworks and enforcement.

As far as I know, at the moment Australia, Canada, the EU, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, Morocco, New Zealand, Singapore, Switzerland and the U.S. are part of the negotiations. The discussion of the issue started in 2007, formal meetings in 2008. There have been eight meetings so far, the latest in New Zealand, this past April. The content of that meeting has been kept under confidentiality so far and there were only some press releases related to them. The countries in question only published a document where they synthesize the basic points dealt with during the preparation of the agreements.

The author is an ethologist and Czech MEP for the Social Democratic party ( ČSSD).

Vytisknout