Minutes - TRIPS Council - View details of the intervention/statement

Ambassador Chak Mun See (Singapore)
H IMPLEMENTATION OF ARTICLE 24.1
114. The representative of Argentina expressed support for the intervention by Mexico. She said that Argentina's view on the scope of the mandate for negotiations was well-known. The new proposal, contained in document IP/C/W/247, which had been introduced at the present meeting, did not provide any new elements nor any elements of substance for the discussion. She had two preliminary comments on the paper. First, her delegation did not understand the persistent use of terms like "anomaly" and "illogical" in the context of international trade and economics, where they were not even employed in psychology since Freud. The other comment concerned paragraph 17 of the paper, which referred to the various means used by Members to implement Articles 22 and 23 with different levels of protection while reasoning that these different levels of protection created a situation of imbalance and contributed to legal uncertainty. In her delegation's view, such a reasoning was simplistic, particularly in view of Article 1.1 of the Agreement which provided that "[…] Members shall be free to determine the appropriate method of implementing the provisions of this Agreement within their own legal system and practice". Whilst the Council could examine the proposal in greater detail, paragraph 17 raised many doubts for her delegation and went to the heart of the TRIPS Agreement and the flexibility and legal freedom which each Member had in its implementation. Regarding the call by the European Communities to be practical and not to adopt a legalistic approach, she wondered whether the European Communities would adopt a similar non legalistic and practical approach with respect to the provisions of the TRIPS Agreement in the context of DSU proceedings to which it was currently party.
IP/C/M/30