Piracy of software and entertainment might never be curtailed “unless someone is in charge to take the credit and take the blame,” House Appropriations Commerce, State, Justice Subcommittee Chmn. Wolf (R-Va.) said Tues. At field hearing in Loudoun County, Va., Wolf told panel of 5 federal officials that “it does seem someone should be responsible domestically and someone internationally” for both enforcement of piracy laws and education on topic. Those officials, representing Depts. of Commerce, State, Justice and the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR), seemed less than enthusiastic. PTO Dir. James Rogan, who also is undersecy. of Commerce for intellectual property, told us after hearing that he wasn’t convinced federal govt. needed “an IP czar.” Wolf held hearing in his district at Va. campus of George Washington U. to emphasize importance of federal funding for intellectual property protection. Witnesses repeatedly focused on need for both enforcement and consumer education.
U.S. Trade Representative’s (USTR) 2002 review of foreign compliance with telecom trade agreements emphasized wireless interconnection rates in European Union (EU) and Japan and raised continued competition concerns in Mexico. Report, which lays out govt.’s telecom trade enforcement priorities for year, also cites concerns over provisioning and pricing of leased telecom lines in EU member states and Switzerland. “It is more important than ever that U.S. telecom operators follow through on our trading partners’ commitments to open markets,” U.S. Trade Representative Robert Zoellick said. While USTR’s report in past has cited telecom competition barriers concerning EU, this year it contained stronger language on interconnection complaints in EU member states. But unlike last year, report shied away from setting deadlines for deciding on whether to take new steps at World Trade Organization to enforce telecom market- opening commitments of U.S. trading partners.
U.S. Trade Representative Robert Zoellick said Wed. he was asking World Trade Organization (WTO) for dispute settlement panel on complaint that Mexico hadn’t opened its cross-border telecom market to competitors. Bush Administration has said in last year that Mexico has made some progress in areas such as ensuring that competitors obtain local interconnection from incumbent Telmex. But serious concerns on international interconnection issues have remained unresolved. Request marks first time USTR under Zoellick has made such request to WTO. In Nov. 2000, U.S. asked WTO to convene dispute settlement panel on complaints about Mexico, process that wasn’t pursued when some progress was made. But USTR said its latest WTO request was focused on unresolved issue of U.S. carriers’ paying inflated charges because “Mexico has still not begun to dismantle its anticompetitive cross-border telecommunications regime.” Panel request is expected to be brought up at March 8 meeting of WTO’s dispute settlement body.
In effort to raise awareness of negative impact that intellectual property (IP) piracy has on U.S. economy, Senate Foreign Affairs Committee Chmn. Biden (D-Del.) held hearing Tues. to review current enforcement regime and call for greater financial support of international law enforcement initiatives. Biden, who also leads Judiciary Committee’s Crime Subcommittee, released report addressing issue of movie, music and computer software piracy, Theft of American Intellectual Property: Fighting Crime Abroad and At Home. Deputy U.S. Trade Representative Peter Allgeier told committee that although Congress had been instrumental in updating laws governing IP theft, greater resources were needed for enforcement efforts and for international outreach. He estimated U.S. creative content owners suffered $20-$25 billion losses per year as a result of international piracy. Allgeier said that in addition to unlawful copying and distributing of content, the Office of the USTR also was concerned with the manufacture and sale of devices that unlawfully intercepted satellite broadcast transmissions. MPAA Pres. Jack Valenti said IP owners must “sit down in good-faith negotiations with the information technology community, makers of computers and video recording devices, to search together for an agreement on standards which would be part of every computer and device.”
Despite efforts by U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) to bring Mexico, Japan and S. Africa into compliance with World Trade Organization (WTO) telecom market-opening commitments, carriers and equipment suppliers told USTR that progress still lagged. In annual USTR comment period, communications companies also singled out new WTO member China as needing to step up reform efforts, particularly on challenges that loom for creating independent telecom regulator. USTR sought comments as part of annual review on effectiveness of U.S. trade agreements involving telecom products and services, including WTO basic telecom agreement. This marks first comment period on operation of U.S. telecom trade agreements opened during tenure of U.S. Trade Representative Robert Zoellick. Compared with last year, fewer comments focused on compliance with telecom market-opening commitments of European Union member states. Ranks of companies providing USTR feedback also didn’t include past commenters such as Global Crossing and Covad, both of which have entered Chapter 11 protection since last year’s comment period.
CompTel told U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) that 11 key trading partners weren’t meeting market-opening obligations of World Trade Organization (WTO) General Agreement on Trade in Services and other trade agreements. That’s double number of noncompliant countries last year, association said in comments filed Fri. Countries cited by CompTel were Brazil, China, Colombia, France, Germany, India, Ireland, Japan, Mexico, S. Africa, Switzerland. Filing as part of USTR’s annual Sec. 1377 review of effectiveness of U.S. telecom trade agreements, CompTel said 4 others should be placed on watch list because of potential problems -- Belgium, Italy, Luxembourg, Spain. CompTel said it had 2 main concerns on trade: (1) Pricing and providing of local access leased lines. (2) High fixed-to-mobile termination rates. It said its members had faced variety of anticompetitive practices and trade barriers in those countries and expressed concern about lack of independent regulatory authorities in some of them. It noted, for example, that rates charged for local access leased lines in Brazil were “far from cost-oriented” and U.S. carriers were frustrated with Colombia’s “failure to adopt transparent licensing rules.” CompTel said China, since entering WTO, was taking positive steps but should establish independent regulatory body.
U.S. Trade Representative’s (USTR) office extended filing deadline for comments on compliance with telecom trade agreements to Fri. (Feb. 1) from Jan. 28. To ensure “timely and expeditious receipt” of comments, USTR said it was accepting submissions in electronic format. E-mails should be sent to FR0013@ustr.gov, with preference for Microsoft Word or WordPerfect. File name of public version of filling should begin with character “P” and confidential business version of filings should begin with “BC,” USTR said.
U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) asked for comments by noon Jan. 28 in annual review of U.S. trade agreements involving telecom products and equipment. Review is required by Sec. 1377 of 1988 Omnibus Trade & Competitiveness Act. General purpose is to determine whether any country’s policies or practices are inconsistent with terms of any trade agreement with U.S. or deny market opportunities to U.S. companies. Current review, which will end March 31, seeks comments on whether: (1) Any World Trade Organization (WTO) member “is acting inconsistently” with WTO Basic Telecom Agreement. (2) Canada or Mexico has failed to comply with N. American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). (3) Members of Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), Inter-American Telecom Commission (CITEL), European Union, Japan, Korea, Mexico or Taiwan have failed to abide by commitments under various agreements with U.S. (4) Outstanding issues remain from last year’s Sec. 1377 review.
CompTel said it “strongly supports” efforts by U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) Robert Zoellick to seek inclusion of procompetitive telecom issues in Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) being negotiated with Chile and Singapore. “Agreements made in the Chile and Singapore FTAs are likely to serve as important precedents for future bilateral and multilateral agreements still to be negotiated,” CompTel said in Nov. 29 letter to Zoellick. CompTel said telecom language should call for: (1) Interconnection, unbundled access to incumbents’ network elements and timely provisioning. (2) Cost-based pricing of incumbents’ leased circuits where there was no competition. (3) Colocation at cost-based rates. (4) Resale at wholesale rates. (5) Access to rights-of-way. (6) Enforcement by independent regulator. (7) Access to public telecom networks by U.S. service providers on nondiscriminatory basis.
European Commission (EC) member Erkki Liikanen, who heads enterprise & information society programs, told European-American Business Council Mon. that network security had taken on “new dimensions” since Sept. 11. “Users need to feel safe,” he said in luncheon speech that was part of 2-day visit to Washington. “A growing number of users experience security and privacy problems.” As example, he said that between Oct. 2000 and last June, spamming incidents had nearly tripled and virus incidents had doubled in European Union (EU). This summer, EC published communication on network & information society proposing creation of European warning and information system to strengthen activities of computer emergency response teams in member states and improve coordination. By year-end, EC plans to publish a “major communication” that would provide road map to areas such as public-private partnerships on network security and address issues such as integrity of Internet and private networks, Liikanen spokesman said. Liikanen said: “We need to develop forward-looking responses to existing emergency security threats and we need to take careful inventory of the measures taken at the national level to guarantee that our preparedness corresponds to global characteristics.”