More Countries React To ACTA; Brazil Says ACTA Is Illegitimate

from the act-now dept

We've already covered how the EU Parliament is skeptical of ACTA. Ditto the Mexican Senate. In the US, which will undoubtedly sign the agreement, at least some politicians are asking questions about the document. Now news is coming out in a few other countries as well. Down in Australia, unlike in the US, they're planning to go through a full scrutiny process involving the Parliament and the public. On the flipside, it sounds like Singapore can't sign the document fast enough.

Of course, what may be most interesting is how countries who are not a part of the negotiations feel about this. Many people feel that the whole ACTA process was set up outside of WIPO and the WTO in order to avoid having to deal with the BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China), which are all developing rapidly, and have a very different viewpoint on intellectual property than the countries involved in the negotiations. So, it's interesting to see that Brazil has already slammed the agreement (Google translation from the original Portuguese). A Brazilian official said that the agreement was not legitimate, negotiated by a closed group without considering all of the issues at play.

ACTA negotiators have said that they hoped, after their own countries agreed to sign onto ACTA, that the BRIC countries would follow down the road. Of course, if they wanted that to happen, perhaps they should have asked them to join the discussions. But, what would that accomplish, since the goal appears to have been to keep many stakeholders out of the negotiations, rather than being inclusive.

Filed Under: acta, australia, brazil, negotiations, signapore