- The Philippines made progress by taking steps to combat pirate production in plants, including increasing the number of raids and enforcement actions.
- The Republic of Korea established a Copyright Protection Center and increased enforcement against institutions using illegal software.
In addition, USTR is pleased to announce that the following countries are being removed from the Watch List because of progress on IPR issues this past year:
- Azerbaijan was removed from the Watch List due to IPR enforcement progress.
- Kazakhstan was removed from the Watch List due to progress on copyright enforcement.
- The Slovak Republic was removed from the Watch List due to progress on protection against unfair commercial use of undisclosed test and other data submitted by pharmaceutical companies seeking marketing approval for their products.
- Uruguay was removed from the Watch List due to progress on copyright enforcement.
The United States commends this positive progress by our trading partners, and urges each one to set a positive example by continuing to take strong IPR enforcement actions to combat piracy and counterfeiting. The United States will continue to work with these and other countries to achieve further improvements in IPR enforcement during the coming year.
Free Trade Agreements and Implementation
The United States is committed to a policy of promoting stronger protection or intellectual property rights. In this regard, the United States is advancing the protection of these rights through a variety of mechanisms, including the negotiation of free trade agreements (FTAs). The intellectual property chapters of U.S. FTAs establish high standards for intellectual property protection for copyright works, trademarks, and patents, and additionally provide strong rules for enforcement.
The United States is pleased that recently concluded FTAs, including the Bahrain FTA, Oman FTA, the Peru Trade Promotion Agreement, the Colombia Trade Promotion Agreement, and the Central America-Dominican Republic Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA-DR) (with Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and the Dominican Republic), will strengthen the protection of IPR in those countries. The United States also is seeking high levels of IPR protection and enforcement in the FTAs that are currently under negotiation with Panama, Thailand, the Southern Africa Customs Union, Ecuador, the United Arab Emirates, and in the ongoing negotiation of a Free Trade Area of the Americas. The United States will also seek strong IPR protection and enforcement in the recently announced FTA negotiations with the Republic of Korea and Malaysia. Another opportunity the United States uses to strengthen the protection and enforcement of intellectual property is the increasing number of trade and investment framework agreement (TIFA) negotiations with several countries in regions such as the Middle East and Asia.
In addition, once an FTA is concluded, the United States works closely with our trading partners to achieve appropriate implementation of FTA obligations in domestic law. The United States
