India makes case against ACTA at WTO meet

India has made a strong case against Anti Counterfeit Trade Agreement (ACTA) – a new international treaty being framed by a group of developed nations – in the annual meeting of the World Trade Organization’s (WTO’s) Council for Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) held in Geneva on October 27.

Indian representatives said agreements such as ACTA had the “portents to completely upset the balance of rights and obligations of the TRIPS agreement”.

According to Geneva-based sources, India re-affirmed its commitment to deal with the enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) issues in line with its TRIPS obligations, but opposed the introduction of “intrusive IPR enforcement rules in international trade” saying it “does not represent a reasonable or realistic response”.

It also warned that such agreements could potentially undermine the multilateral decisions like the Doha Declaration of WTO.

The final round of negotiations for ACTA had ended on October 2. The negotiating nations – Australia, Canada, the European Union, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Morocco, New Zealand, Singapore, Switzerland and the US – are expected to release the final version of the agreement soon.

Indian delegation informed TRIPS council that the October 2 text of ACTA had several elements that has far-reaching implications for non-members of ACTA, adding the country doubted if ACTA was TRIPS-compliant.