U.S. again ranks Poland high on list of international copyright law offenders

Poland has for a successive year been listed by the U.S. on the group of countries that failed to abide by international copyright laws. The accusation particularly concerns the counterfeiting of computer programs, music CDs and cassettes, and the illegal publication of books. Earlier the U.S. Department of Commerce published the "Special 301" report which included Poland among the 70 countries that were breaching intellectual property conventions. In the opinion of the Business Software Alliance (BSA), a watchdog for software producers, 61% of all programs running on computers in Poland are pirated. The BSA believes the high ranking of Poland on the blacklist will give impetus for high profile talks between Poland and the U.S. to begin. The report would also serve as a reminder for the World Trade Organization (WTO) to start enforcing trading laws. (Puls Biznesu, page 11) S.M.