WikiLeaks exposes IP chapter of 
Pacific Rim deal

By Eric Bradner

November 13, 2013--WikiLeaks ripped back the curtain Wednesday on a blockbuster trade pact that the United States, Japan and 10 other Pacific Rim countries are negotiating just as those talks reach a critical juncture.

The website posted what it says is the intellectual property rights chapter of the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership pact.

The document, dated Aug. 30, contains the results of the 19th negotiating round, which had then just wrapped up in Brunei.

The release of the 94-page chapter—which is filled with bracketed text indicating that the countries are still hammering out the details—comes as U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman’s staff presses to finalize the deal by the end of this year.

Interest in the deal’s contents is so high that a website, freetpp.org, has promised a reward for the full negotiating text.

Its reward offer has swung wildly, from $1 billion at one point to about $74,000 as of Wednesday morning.

“The U.S. administration is aggressively pushing the TPP through the U.S. legislative process on the sly,” said Julian Assange, the WikiLeaks editor-in-chief, in a release.

“If instituted, the TPP’s IP regime would trample over individual rights and free expression, as well as ride roughshod over the intellectual and creative commons,” said Assange.

 “If you read, write, publish, think, listen, dance, sing or invent; if you farm or consume food; if you’re ill now or might one day be ill, the TPP has you in its crosshairs.”

Pharmaceutical patents and copyright issues addressed through the intellectual property rights chapter have proven especially controversial, as the United States seeks strong protections for its drug-makers, and Asian countries fight for cheaper medicines.

The released chapter shows the United States working to aid drug-makers and medical device manufacturers largely by limiting the opportunities for other countries to ignore those patents in the interest of public health.

The chapter shows that the United States is seeking to limit the ability of countries to claim “public health” reasons to ignore patent rights by restricting those exceptions to epidemics and disallowing diseases such as cancer.

The United States is also pushing to ease drug-makers’ ability to obtain patents overseas and in developing countries and to extend the duration of those patents beyond 20 years.

It’s possible that the language contained in the leaked document is out of date, as the intellectual property negotiations likely have advanced since August.

Countries’ negotiators for that section have met twice since then—once in Mexico and once in Washington, D.C.

A spokeswoman for the U.S. Trade Representative’s office said negotiations are continuing on the IP chapter.

“We are working with Congress, stakeholders and our TPP negotiating partners to reach an outcome that promotes high-paying jobs in innovative American industries and reflects our values, including by seeking strong and balanced copyright protections, as well as advancing access to medicines while incentivizing the development of new, life-saving drugs,” USTR spokeswoman Carol Guthrie said.

Critics of the Obama administration’s stance responded to the development Wednesday by taking aim at the proposals, saying that the United States is locking in high prices at the expense of global health considerations.

“The Obama administration’s shameful bullying on behalf of the giant drug companies would lead to preventable suffering and death in Asia-Pacific countries,” said Peter Maybarduk, director of Public Citizen’s global access to medicines program, in a statement.

Doctors Without Borders also blasted the United States’ stance on intellectual property rights in the pact.

“The leak of the secret text confirms that the U.S. government continues to steamroll its trading partners in the face of steadfast opposition over terms that will severely restrict access to affordable medicines for millions of people,” said Judit Rius Sanjuan, U.S. manager of the organization’s Access Campaign, which works to provide drugs and medical care in developing countries.

“The U.S. is refusing to back down from dangerous provisions that will impede timely access to affordable medicines.”

Though Wednesday marked WikiLeaks’ first foray into trade negotiations, this isn’t the first time the Trans-Pacific Partnership’s intellectual property section has been the subject of a leak.

An early draft of the section was released in early 2011 by Knowledge Ecology International.