AFP Photo /
Michal Cizek
A wolf in
sheep’s clothing – that’s how ACTA opponents have described the international
copyright treaty. Thousands are to protest in Sweden on Saturday while in
Poland the legislation has been suspended after attacks on government websites.
Polish
Prime Minister Donald Tusk said on Friday that a wider discussion should be
held before the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement comes into force. The talks
should involve both Internet users and privacy protection agencies, Tusk added.
Ratification of the document has been postponed pending the results of those
talks.
Reports say
similar demonstrations are set to take place in other countries across Europe,
including the UK, France, Germany, Poland and other countries.
The
Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement is a plurilateral agreement involving a
number of countries including the US, Australia and Japan, as well as the
European Union. The UK and 21 other EU member states signed the agreement on
January 26. It now has to be ratified by the European Parliament and is
scheduled to be debated in June.
The treaty
aims at establishing a legal framework to stop the cross-border trade in
counterfeit goods. However many, including insiders, say the document
jeopardizes Internet freedoms.
The former European Parliament rapporteur for
ACTA, Kader Arif, resigned his post last Friday after the treaty was signed by
the EU, condemning the whole process leading to the signature of the agreement.
He later
told the Guardian that the treaty threatens online freedom and could mean that
someone crossing a border with a laptop containing a single song or movie
potentially facing criminal charges.
“The title
of this agreement is misleading, because it is not only about counterfeiting,
it is about the violation of intellectual property rights," Kader Arif
told the Guardian. "There is a major difference between these two
concepts."
ACTA, which
is often compared to America’s controversial SOPA and PIPA bills, has led to
major protests in several European states. In solidarity with the movement, the
online activist collective Anonymous has launched a series of Internet attacks.
Related Articles:
No comments:
Post a Comment