July 23, 2012. The plenary at WIPO has started again briefly before lunch. While there is not much progress on a text about broadcasting protection there seems to be consensus among governments regarding the nature of the instrument: it has to be a treaty. No one seems to be talking about a soft recommendation for broadcasters!
The Chair has provided the Committee with a non paper…8 pages long that was supposed to include the latest proposals by South Africa, Mexico and Japan. Obviously Japan does not believe its proposals are really included but there is “progress.” To quote the US delegation spokesperson, Shira Perlmutter of USPTO “we agree that we need to move this forward”.
Here some excerpts from the transcript from this morning plenary:
Vice Chair of SCCR24: we are looking to make a treaty that corresponds to the current need to have an updated protection, Chair definitely chose this signal neutral based approach for technology.
[…]
JAPAN: Thank you, Madam Chair as I mentioned previously we don’t think all proposals we have is not treated — is treated equally unfortunately. So in that sense we have the same feeling as expressed by the delegate of Iran so at this stage we cannot accept treating this text as a formal text for further discussion. But taking the fact into account that it is the non-paper of the Chair, we can discuss how to modify it, including by putting proper alternatives maybe informal consultations. So we still want to keep a constructive manner in those — in the further consultations. Thank you.EUROPEAN UNION: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, I — Madam Chair I do have the full statement again where we highlight the importance of work on a area broadcasting has for the European Union and the Member States. You have heard us saying this many times. So I don’t think I need to repeat it. But rather at the stage we are and as regards our preliminary reaction to the Chair’s non-paper that you have put on the table, we first of all clearly want to thank the efforts and to reaffirm the will of the European Union and it’s Member States to progress rapidly on this issue. […]
Having said that, we understand the concerns expressed by Japan and that have been echoed by Iran. We need to find here in whatever the form the document is going to take a balance between a mere compilation on the one hand which you said you want to avoid and you’re right to want to avoid. But we need a text that reflects all of the positions that were discussed at the informal on Saturday, which in our view and after having looked at these quite rapidly is not necessarily the case in this text.[…]>> NIGERIA: Thank you, Madam Chair. And let me on behalf of the Africa Group express a deep appreciation for the work that’s clearly gone into this document converging any number of proposals is no easy task and doing it over a weekend is even harder so let me say thank you and much gratitude from the Africa group. Let me echo both what the Distinguished Delegate of the EU and the Distinguished Delegate of Iran and the Distinguished Delegate of Japan have all said. I think for the purpose of ensuring the integrity of discussions and making sure that there is a common — a common foundation for work it is important for this document to reflect the views and perspectives of other delegations that may feel that it does not currently do so. So we do believe in the interest of progress it makes sense to have alternatives even if they are in a condensed form so that the issue where there are significant or even material differences are shown as alternatives and perhaps limit the footnotes to issues that are more incidental for which there may be easy agreement.
So we would like to encourage perhaps the use of informals to get that work done so that what is produced is accepted or agreeable by all in principle as a Chair’s non-paper or a working text.>> UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: Thank you, Madam Chair the United States would also like to thank the Chair and the Secretariat for their hard work on this document. We continue to give you weekend and late-night homework assignments and we realise it’s not always easy to satisfy everyone at the same time. We do recognize the desire of all delegations to maintain all of the proposals that they have made at this stage in the document and we also appreciate the flexibility that we’re hearing on all sides to agree to work with this text on the basis that it is not a formal text but just a non-paper from the Chair to help us move along.[…]
But we agree that we need to move this forward. […]
>> BRAZIL: Thank you, Madam Chair. Good morning to everyone the delegation of Brazil thanks the Chairman for having prepared the Chair’s non-paper. […]
However we would like to make some preliminary comments on the process without prejudice to other comments we may add in the future.
It’s the understanding of Brazil that the work being carried out in the Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights based offer preliminary sessions and consultations shouldn’t depart from the guidance provided by the General Assembly. The General Assembly’s mandate should maintain the work being carried out by WIPO. We first should look forward to agreeing on objectives, specific scope and the object of protection. Following a signal based approach and confining the instrument of a Broadcasting Organisation in a traditional sense.
It may sound repetitive but I would like to recall what’s been decided by this committee in the conclusions of the 23rd session it’s Paragraph 11 on Page 2 I quote the committee reaffirms it’s commitment to continue work on a signal based approach consistent with the 2007 General Assembly mandate towards developing an international treaty to update the protection of broadcasting and cablecasting of organisations in the traditional sense. End of quote.
This should be reflected in any working document that needs to be balanced and to reflect the positions of Member States on the issues especially on the mandate. […]>> MEXICO: Thank you very much, Chairman. We are extremely grateful for the document which has been prepared by the Chairman. My delegation is of the opinion that a very considerable effort has been with it by the Secretariat and it was an excellent initiative that the Chairman took. We acknowledge the very considerable amount of work that has gone into enabling us to have this document in front of us today. I would like to tell you that the Mexican delegation has absolutely no problem with this document being formally adopted as the document for the work of this committee. Thank you very much.
>> CHAIR: I thank the delegation of Mexico and I give the floor to South Africa.
>> SOUTH AFRICA: Thank you very much, Madam Chair. We really thank the Secretariat and the Chair for putting together this document. Without a doubt it isn’t an easy task putting together various positions. It is not a perfect text. But from my delegation’s point of view we feel that we can work together and maybe in an effort to accommodate the other viewpoints that have been — perceived not to have been accommodated my delegation is prepared to work with the Chair in ensuring that all of the views are accommodated. I think for us the text provides a stepping point, a stepping point in the right direction ensuring we have a single text. Therefore, we are available to work with the Chair, the Secretariat and all of the Member States to ensure that we have a text that includes the views of everyone. Thank you very much.
NGOs have the floor