EU Parliament Majority Expresses Support for ACTA

The ACTA related vote in the European Parliament took place earlier today

A majority in the European Parliament just voted in favor of a resolution saying that it

”regrets that China has not taken part in the negotiations on the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA)”

Although this is not quite the same as voting yes to the ACTA agreement as such, it is a very alarming signal that there may in fact be a majority to say yes to ACTA in the European Parliament, despite all statements about ”ACTA being dead” that have been circulating in the press and elsewhere.

The vote was a separate vote on a part of a bigger resolution with the title ”EU and China: Unbalanced Trade?”. The mention of ACTA is in Article 15 of the resolution.

That the whole resolution was adopted is one thing, since it contained lots of other things, and members of the European Parliament (MEPs) may have liked the other things enough to vote in favor of the resolution for that reason.

But the alarming thing is that the separate vote on the ACTA sentence was carried. (I of course voted against.)

This is a wake-up call for all net activists who have gotten the impression that we have already won ACTA. This is absolutely not true. The battle is still going on, and after today’s vote I feel very concerned indeed.

Next week a number of committees in the European Parliament will be voting on opinions on ACTA. These votes are not decisive in themselves, but will be steps on the way towards the eventual acceptance or rejection of ACTA.

Contact your MEPs now, and remind them about the reasons for rejecting ACTA. This is absolutely urgent.

The final outcome of ACTA hangs in the balance right now.