ACTA[1] is short for Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement a treaty currently being negotiated by some countries and organizations, including the EU and the US. Apparently the US are pushing forward to achieve a consent on it by January 2010. Thus we have only little time left to act.
Leaked information on the content can be found at Wikileaks [2], at EDRI [3] and on the foundation for a free information society website. [4] If that is not enough, you can add the U.S based Knowledge Ecology International[6] to this list. That these NGO’s all use the same tone regarding to ACTA is no surprise.
None of ACTA is official; the entire negotiations have been kept secret from both the public and certain elected politicians. This practice is overly corrosive to all democracies and corrupting to global society. The process takes place without the input of the public or a wide range of other affected stakeholders such as EuroISPA [5].
The content of the treaty is shared among hundreds of corporate lobbyists like RIAA, MPAA, the pharmaceutical industries and patent lobbies. They are called cleared advisors, being allowed to have access and deliver their input - as opposed to the members of parliaments [7]! This is utterly wrong.
The involved government figures are trying to create legislation and bypass any public review, knowing that they have academic consensus against them, and that once the treaty is signed it will be extremely hard to reverse!
Other contries will then be pressured into signing the treaty, but they will not have had any part in writing or ammending it. The treaty will strongly limit civil liberties, especially regarding access to knowledge and culture. These “agreements” are remarkably obstructive to developing countries that do not yet have a developed IP industry. We risk repeating the history of powerful nations’ colonization of underdeveloped countries. This is intellectual slavery.
The supposed content of the treaty aside, the process itself in which it is created and implemented in the global political framework is to be condemned and the treaty should be stopped and abolished, regardless of the content. No democratic country should be allowed to implement legislation in such way as it is about to happen with ACTA.
The way ACTA is implemented resembles a global dictatorship of certain industry branches in complete disregard for maintainable development of society, civil liberties and proper democratic due process. The sole purpose of this treaty is to implement extreme legislation on a global scale without any public participation.
This matter does not just affect the pirate parties but all democracy-respecting organizations. A world wide united front of freedom loving citizens is needed to impede this global assault against democracy and civil liberties of each and every human being.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Counterfeiting_Trade_Agreement
[2] http://wikileaks.org/wiki/Category:ACTA
[3] http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number7.22/acta-mobilizing-to-stop
[4] http://action.ffii.org/acta/Analysis
[5] http://www.euroispa.org/
[6] http://keionline.org/acta
[7] http://www.pressreleasepoint.com/eu-council-may-pass-acta-silently-during-parliamentary-recess
