As reported previously, Australia, Canada, the European Union, Japan, Korea, Mexico, New Zealand, Singapore, Switzerland and the United States have requested the WTO TRIPS Council to hold a discussion on IP Enforcement Trends (ie, ACTA). At the beginning of discussions this morning, Bolivia, Brazil, China, Cuba, Ecuador, Egypt, India and Venezuela objected to the inclusion of an agenda item on ACTA noting that the TRIPS Council’s purpose did not have the mandate to discuss ACTA, a TRIPS-plus development outside the scope of the multilateral trading system. It should be noted that according to the WTO TRIPS Council website, the TRIPS Council “is responsible for administering the TRIPS Agreement, in particular monitoring the operation of the Agreement”. According to an informed source, China stated that the discussion of ACTA should fall under “Any other business” but then accepted the discussion of agenda item N on “IP Enforcement Trends” with the understanding that ACTA would NOT be a permanent agenda item at the TRIPS Council. KEI was also informed that the final text of the ACTA Agreement was distributed on the request of ACTA proponents with the justification that they were being “transparent in showing WTO members best practices in IP enforcement”. Discussions of ACTA started at approximately 4:30 PM Geneva time. Since the WTO TRIPS Council is off limits to non-governmental organizations and the press, we only have sketchy reports on what is transpiring inside. A fuller picture should emerge when the WTO concludes its discussions on ACTA this evening.