intellectual property legislation, particularly in the copyright area. For example, Korea still apparently fails to provide full protection to works created after 1950, as required by the TRIPS Agreement. In December 2000, the Korean National Assembly passed welcome amendments to the Computer Programs Protection Act (CPPA), but these fail to provide explicit protection for temporary copies, as required by the TRIPS Agreement. We look to the Korean Government to make the necessary improvements to its copyright regime in the coming year. It also remains unclear whether Korean law protects against the unfair commercial use of confidential test data as mandated by TRIPS.
The United States will continue its detailed dialogue with the Korean Government on intellectual property issues and will periodically review Korea's progress on both legislative and enforcement issues. The U.S. Government hopes that continued progress in these areas will result in a substantial reduction in software piracy and other tangible improvements, which would lead to a favorable review of Korea's Special 301 status later this year.
Lebanon
Cable piracy is a particular problem in Lebanon. There are over 1,000 cable operators in the country, many of whom retransmit domestic and foreign programming without authorization from right-holders. Piracy of video and audio cassettes is common, and virtually the entire market for video games is illegitimate. Software and book piracy is equally widespread. Unauthorized software is used not only by small companies, but also by major banks, trading companies and much of the government. Lebanese censorship authorities have seized some inbound pirated videotapes at the border and police are raiding video shops. Other elements in the Lebanese Government, however, are not as diligent about intellectual property protection. Police enforcement efforts are thwarted by a clogged judicial system apparently incapable of handling intellectual property cases. Further, there is very little enforcement against software piracy, even though the industry makes the effort to inform the government about particular companies that use unauthorized software. Protection of patents in Lebanon is stronger. The Lebanese Government passed a new industrial property law that is more thorough than the law it replaced and, with some amendments, will be able to bring Lebanon into compliance with its patent obligations in TRIPS. We will continue to press Lebanon to address its severe copyright protection problems.
Malaysia
During the past year, Malaysia passed a number of new laws meant to strengthen the protection of intellectual property and bring the country into compliance with its obligations under the TRIPS Agreement. These include amendments to the copyright, patent, and trademarks laws as well as new laws on protection of integrated circuits and geographical indications. A particularly positive development over the past year was the enactment of the Optical Disc Act, which when fully implemented should prove to be an effective tool to fight copyright piracy. However, so far Malaysia has only begun to take the steps necessary to enforce these new laws, particularly the optical media licensing law. While the Malaysian Government has launched thousands of raids and plant inspections over the past two years, virtually no criminal prosecutions for piracy have yet been completed. Nonetheless, we remain encouraged by the enactment of these new laws and the important first steps that have been taken since March 15, 2001, to implement the Optical
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