The EU Parliament’s Legal Affairs committee is set to rubber stamp a new
text on Monday for the controversial EU Directive on the Enforcement of
Intellectual Property Rights, despite serious unanswered concerns from
across the EU — including the UK House of Lords. It will have been only
six days since the final text, drafted in secret without any public
analysis of its detailed national implications, was finally released to
the European public.
In the words of one MEP speaking at a meeting in Strasbourg last week,
“This is Europe, not London. This is how we do things here. You just
have to trust us”.
FFII is very concerned that, without
better defined safeguards, the Directive may lead to a far more
agressive, lawyer-driven legal environment for creative businesses in Europe; and
having seen how such legislation can be used in the United States, that
it may provide the means for agressive litigators holding dubious
intellectual property rights to “pull a SCO” and use the powers of the
Directive to seriously harass and inflict lasting damage
on small innovative businesses.
Full story at
http://www.ffii.org.uk/releases/040219_trust.html“
Link: ffii.org.uk
Category:
- Legal
