The fate of the controversial anti-piracy agreement is in the gift of MEPs. David Martin and Christofer Fjellner comment on their groups' views.

Interview: Pros and cons of ACTA

https://api.multimedia.europarl.europa.eu/documents/20125/15961090/n003-0184-en_mf.srt

ACTA. The EU's anti-piracy agreement  has thousands of people on the streets

and millions signing petitions of protest.

All fear their civil rights are threatened

by an agreement to protect  European intellectual property.

After Lisbon and new veto powers  on international treaties,

the European Parliament  has the final say,

which should come in July.  Which way is it swinging?

I conclude that, on balance,  I think we should be saying no to ACTA.

I want to make it clear I'm in favour  of protecting intellectual property.

I believe we must protect  European innovation and invention

and reward artists and others  for their creations.

But that must be weighed against ACTA's  human rights and civil liberties aspects.

is the idea that internet service providers  should act as the internet police force.

I support the idea  of the ACTA agreement,

but I can't support the text as such,  as it lies before us.

I'm sure the European Commission and  Member States, who negotiated this text,

actually can make a difference, a change,  either in the text

or by giving us other ways  of creating the legal certainty we need.

If they tell me that  they're willing to do this,

and they tell me that  before the vote in plenary,

Then we have to wait to give them  enough time to solve the problems,

so we have a legal framework to protect  intellectual property rights globally.

But the devil is in the detail.  Vague wording over the distinction

between private and commercial use  of intellectual property has MEPs worried.

One fear people have is,  what is commercial usage?

Clearly if I'm sitting at home downloading  a film illegally, which I wouldn't do,

I won't be prosecuted for doing that  if it's for my own use.

But what if I download it and then I share it  with you and pass it on to a colleague?

Is that commercial usage  or is that still private usage?

There is an obligation for the signing parties  to apply criminal sanctions

on people that do infringe intellectual  property rights on a commercial scale,

But the big question is,  what does that mean?

I don't want, and I don't think anyone  who works in this Parliament really wants,

Given the protests, did the Commission  get its public diplomacy wrong on ACTA?

They assumed this was a technical treaty  and the public wouldn't be interested.

And when the public got interested,  there was no good media strategy

to explain ACTA to the general public  and the fears grew.

The protests around ACTA  tell me two things.

Firstly, the time of holding negotiations  around important legislation for citizens

behind closed doors,  that's a thing of the past.

That provokes reactions  and that makes people concerned.

Secondly, anything to do with  the internet and copyright

provokes reactions  throughout Europe, I know.

It provokes reactions among many people  who are engaged in the internet debate.

But at the same time we must remember  this is not only about the internet,

it's not even mostly  about the internet or copyright.

It's mostly about  other intellectual property rights,

the fact that we have to stop  fake medicines,

the problem that 2%  of aviation spare parts are falsified.

It's also about guaranteeing  that we have safe products

If Europe leads, will the others follow?

One thing about ACTA is that it's been  described as a coalition of the willing.

The countries that have signed up  for ACTA have products to protect.

The Chinese, the Indians, the Russians,  and many other countries

which breach intellectual property at  the moment have not signed up for ACTA.

So I question how it helps us  bring those countries into line.

The important thing is that  we put out a gold standard

on how we want the protection  of intellectual property rights

I think it's a little bit like the strategy  we have around climate change.

In the Kyoto Protocol,  the big emitters of CO2, China, the US,

are not part of it  and haven't signed up to it.

But we still think it's worth the effort  of gathering a coalition

of those who take this problem seriously  and try to create our strategy

and hope the others will come along  and follow.

We should do the same thing  when it comes to piracy.