Russia has made little headway on its pledges to defend intellectual property rights, while new forms of piracy continue to emerge, the Office of the United States Trade Representative said Friday.
The office, Washington's main trade negotiator, announced the findings in a global report based on consultations with foreign governments and stakeholders who are harmed by violations of intellectual property rights.
The Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland were commended for making "significant positive progress" in tightening regulations and enforcement over the past year.
Russia, however, was on a "priority watch list" of 11 countries that "do not provide an adequate level of IPR protection or enforcement, or market access for persons relying on intellectual property protection," which will be addressed in bilateral talks, the report said.
The findings highlight one of the long-standing disputes that has slowed Moscow's start-and-stop, 17-year bid to join the World Trade Organization. In March, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said during a meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton that "only three [trade] issues remain … [and] they aren't of any serious importance to the U.S. economy or to our economy."
The report flagged faked pharmaceuticals in Russia as an area of particular concern. Counterfeiters have begun to act as branding middlemen, importing unbranded goods and then repackaging them for export as branded products, it said.
Additionally, Russia was accused of continuing to ignore commitments to fight Internet and disk piracy outlined in a 2006 bilateral agreement. The deal's deadline for full compliance was in 2007.
Some changes to Russian law and customs regulations that would bring protections closer to international norms are still tied up in the State Duma, while the recently passed law on medicines did not implement the 2006 agreement's provision to protect pharmaceutical test data, the report said.
The office also took issue with enforcement tactics such as raids on disk manufacturers and closing web sites. Disk makers are often tipped off before raids, while new web sites are easily opened, it said, adding that prosecutors are "reluctant to initiate criminal cases in the field of IPR."
The report did note a few positive developments, such as a 2008 ban on camcorders in movie theaters; more effective efforts to fight trademark squatters; and a decline in business software piracy.
Nonetheless, clones of the popular online music site AllofMP3.com remain prevalent, while markets like Gorbushka and Savyolovsky are notorious for their "widely and openly available" counterfeited movies, music and software.
AllofMP3.com was shut down in 2007, but its director was later acquitted by a Moscow court after U.S. recording companies withdrew their lawsuit. In February, authorities closed Torrent.ru, Russia's most popular BitTorrent tracker, but it quickly migrated to the domain RuTracker.org, which is administered from the Bahamas.
File hosting sites like iFolder.ru and Filehoster.ru have also seen increased attention from the police this year. Servers were briefly seized from iFolder.ru's offices during a pornography investigation in March and only released after President Dmitry Medvedev told Interior Minister Rashid Nurgaliyev to look into the legality of the raid.
Police took Filehoster.ru offline last week for "unknown reasons," the company said in a statement on its home page.
A Message from The Moscow Times:
Dear readers,
We are facing unprecedented challenges. Russia's Prosecutor General's Office has designated The Moscow Times as an "undesirable" organization, criminalizing our work and putting our staff at risk of prosecution. This follows our earlier unjust labeling as a "foreign agent."
These actions are direct attempts to silence independent journalism in Russia. The authorities claim our work "discredits the decisions of the Russian leadership." We see things differently: we strive to provide accurate, unbiased reporting on Russia.
We, the journalists of The Moscow Times, refuse to be silenced. But to continue our work, we need your help.
Your support, no matter how small, makes a world of difference. If you can, please support us monthly starting from just $2. It's quick to set up, and every contribution makes a significant impact.
By supporting The Moscow Times, you're defending open, independent journalism in the face of repression. Thank you for standing with us.
Remind me later.