According to Article 27 of the Law on Industrial Property (1994), paragraph 1(b): "(2) Where the patent concerns a product, the owner of the patent shall have the right to prevent third parties from performing, without his authorization, the following acts: (a) the making of a product incorporating the protected invention; (b) the offering or the putting on the market of a product incorporating the protected invention, the using of such a product, or the importing or stocking of such a product for such offering or putting on the market". In such cases, it is considered as working patent; so, no compulsory licence can be granted.

The granting of compulsory licences is regulated under Articles 39 and 40 of the Law and general provisions adopted by government (temporary) for granting a compulsory licence: (1) On the request of any person who proves his ability to work the patented invention in the Republic of Albania, made after the expiration of a period of four years from the filing date of the application for the patent or three years from the grant of the patent, whichever is later, the Patent Office may grant a non-exclusive, non-voluntary licence if the patented invention is not worked or is insufficiently worked in the Republic of Albania. The grant of the non-voluntary licence shall be subject to the payment of equitable remuneration to the owner of the patent. (2) A non-voluntary licence shall not be granted if the Patent Office is convinced that circumstances exist which justify the non-working or insufficient working of the patented invention in the Republic of Albania. (3) In deciding whether to grant a non-voluntary licence, the Patent Office shall give both the owner of the patent and the person requesting the non-voluntary licence an adequate opportunity to present arguments. (4) Any non-voluntary licence shall be revoked when the circumstances which led to its granting cease to exist, taking into account the legitimate interests of the patent owner and of the licensee. The continued existence of these circumstances shall be reviewed upon request of the patent owner. Where the national security or public safety so requires, the Prime Minister may authorize, even without the agreement of the owner of the patent or of the applicant, by notice published in the Official Journal, a government agency or a person designated in the said notice to make, use or sell an invention to which a patent or a patent application for a patent relates, subject to payment of equitable remuneration to the owner of the patent or the applicant. The decision of the Prime Minister may be the subject of an appeal to the Court. 1. An applicant for a compulsory licence shall be required to prove that the requirements for a compulsory licence have been complied with, and further that a) the patentee was unwilling to grant a voluntary licence to exploit the patent under appropriate conditions and within a reasonable period of time; b) he is able to exploit the invention to the required extent. 2. The scope and duration of a compulsory licence shall be established by the court, taking into account the purpose of the exploitation authorized by the compulsory licence; a compulsory licence may be granted with or without limitation. Unless relinquished or cancelled, a compulsory licence shall have effect until expiration of the term of validity fixed by the court or until the lapse of patent protection. Compulsory licences shall be recorded in the Patent Register. 3. The patentee shall receive adequate compensation for the compulsory licence, which shall be fixed, failing agreement between the parties, by the court. The compensation shall take into adequate account the economic value of the compulsory licence. In particular, it shall be commensurate with the royalty the holder of the compulsory licence would have paid on the basis of an exploitation contract concluded with the patentee, taking into account the licensing conditions in the technical field of the invention. 4. The holder of a compulsory licence shall have the same rights as the patentee in regard to the maintenance of the patent and exercise of the rights deriving from protection. 5. A compulsory licence may not be assigned or transferred to any other person. Compulsory licences are non-exclusive and non-transferable, even in the form of sublicence, except with that part of the enterprise or goodwill which exploits such licence. The holder of the compulsory licence may not grant a licence of exploitation. 6. The holder of a compulsory licence may relinquish his compulsory licence at any time. If the holder does not begin exploitation within one year from the definitive grant of the compulsory licence, the patentee may claim modification or cancellation of the compulsory licence. 7. The patentee may request modification or cancellation of a compulsory licence if the circumstances on which it was based cease to exist and are unlikely to occur again. Modification or cancellation shall take a form that does not prejudice the legitimate interests of the holder of the compulsory licence.

Our legislation does not provide (until now) for the granting of compulsory licence to allow the exploitation of a patent ("second patent") which cannot be exploited without infringing another patent ("the first patent").

Our law provides for such a principle in its Articles 41-42: (1) Subject to this Law, the performance of any act referred to in Article 27(1), 27(2) and 27(4) in Albania by a person other than the owner of the patent, and without the consent of the latter, in relation to a product or process falling within the scope of protection of the patent shall constitute an infringement of the patent. (2) Subject to this Law, the performance of any act referred to in Article 27(1), 27(2) and 27(4) in Albania by a person other than the applicant, and without the consent of the applicant, in relation to a product or process falling within the scope of provisional protection conferred on a published patent application under Article 20(3) shall constitute an infringement of that provisional protection. (1) The owner of a patent and the applicant for a patent shall have the right to institute proceedings in the Court against any person who has infringed or is infringing the patent or the provisional protection conferred on a published patent application. The owner of the patent and the applicant shall have the same rights against any person who has performed acts or is performing acts which make it likely that such infringement will occur ("imminent infringement"). The proceedings may not be instituted after five years from the act of infringement. (2)(a) If the owner of the patent proves that an infringement has been committed or is being committed, the Court shall award damages and shall grant an injunction to prevent further infringement and any other remedy provided in the general law. (b) If the owner of the patent proves imminent infringement, the Court shall grant an injunction to prevent infringement and any other remedy provided in the general law. (3)(a) Unless the licence contract provides otherwise, any licensee may request the owner of the patent to institute Court proceedings for any infringement indicated by the licensee, who must specify the relief desired. (b) Such licensee may, if he proves that the owner of the patent received the request but refuses or fails to institute the proceedings within three months from the receipt of the request, institute the proceedings in his own name, after notifying the owner of the patent of his intention. The owner of the patent shall have the right to join in the proceedings. (c) Even before the end of the three-month period referred to in subparagraph (3)(b), the Court shall, on the request of the licensee, grant an appropriate injunction to prevent infringement or to prohibit its continuation, if the licensee proves that immediate action is necessary to avoid substantial damage. (4) Where the subject matter of the patent is a process for obtaining a product, the burden of establishing that a product was not made by the process shall be on the alleged infringer if either of the following conditions is fulfilled: (a) the product is new; or (b) a substantial likelihood exists that the product was made by the process and the owner of the patent has been unable through reasonable efforts to determine the process actually used. Articles 12, 14 and 17 of Civil Procedure Code provide also the principle of burden of proof in a process patent litigation.

Protection of undisclosed test or other data submitted by an applicant in the procedure for market authorization of a pharmaceutical is provided under the "Regulation of the Commission for the Verification of Manufacturing Conditions on Pharmaceutical" point 12 and under the Regulation "On a supplement and a change on the regulation No. 393 dated 20 January 1998 - On the Registration of Drugs in the Republic of Albania" point 2. In both of them it is defined that this information is confidential and, after the verification by the Commission, the documentation is deposited in the National Center of Drugs Control together with a copy of the marketing authorisation and is exclusive property of the Albanian authorities. The time period during which Albania protects data submitted to obtain marketing approval for pharmaceuticals is not defined (normally, it can't be less than the period of the working of the factory or the validity of the marketing authorization). Each pharmaceutical company submits the dossier for any drugs to get marketing authorization along with the bioequivalent study, when required. All this information is protected and other applicants or third persons are not allowed to consult it. The legislation does not provide for exceptions to this. Concerning agricultural chemical products, data submitted by companies in order to obtain marketing authorization is protected by the Decision of the Council of Ministers No. 72 dated 15 February 2001 "On the Approval of the regulation of Plant Protection Products". In Article 6 of this regulation it is defined the protection of data is ensured upon request of the applicant and no time limit is foreseen for this.

According to the "Law on Industrial Property" (1994) (articles 83, 89 and 101) and Article 19 of the Law "Some changes and supplements on the Law on industrial property" (1999) constitute effective deterrents to infringement of industrial property rights. The owner of the registered mark shall have the right to institute proceedings in the Court against any person who has infringed or is infringing his rights under the conditions of Article 83 of the Law. The owner shall have the same right against any person who has performed acts or is performing acts which make it likely that such infringement will occur ("imminent infringement"). If the owner of the registered mark proves that an infringement has been committed or is being committed, the Court shall award compensation. In these compensations will be included the profit of the person who has performed the infringement, the damage which has incurred the owner of the mark except the one is included in the profit of the breaker and the expenses including the law costs. The Court shall grant an injunction to prevent further infringement and any other remedy provided in the general law. If the owner of the registered mark proves imminent infringement, the Court shall grant an injunction to prevent further infringement and any other remedy provided in this Law and in the Code of Civil Procedure. In addition to the measures specified in the previous paragraphs, the Court may re-establish the situation that existed before the infringement and to stop infringing actions, to proceed with an effective seizure of the goods and, when necessary, to destroy illegally used marks, tools that could be used to manufacture the goods and the goods themselves in absence of possibility to remove any illegally mark from such goods. The judicial authorities shall have the authority to order prompt and effective provisional measures: - to prevent an infringement of any intellectual property right from occurring, and in particular to prevent the entry into channels of commerce in their jurisdiction of goods, including imported goods immediately after customs clearance; - to preserve relevant evidence in regard to the alleged infringement. The new Article 89(3) of the Law on Industrial Property states: In addition to the measures specified in paragraph 2(a) of this Article, the Court may re-establish the situation that existed before the infringement and to stop infringing actions, to proceed with an effective seizure of the goods and, when necessary, to destroy illegally used marks, tools that could be used to manufacture the goods and the goods themselves in absence of possibility to remove any illegally used mark from such goods. Any natural or legal person who performs an act which he knows constitutes an infringement of the patent, mark or design shall commit an offence and shall be punishable from the Court by a fine between lek 20,000 and 100,000. The Penal Code, as amended by the Law 7883 dated 24 January 2001, under Article 288(a) states that the unlawful production and distribution on commercial scale of industrial and nutritive articles and goods constitutes a criminal infringement and is punishable with fine or imprisonment up to 2 years. This offence, when committed in collaboration with other persons, more than once, orwhen it has caused serious consequences, is punishable with imprisonment from 3 to 10 years. Article 50 of Copyright Law as amended by the Law No. 8594 dated 6 April 2000 underlines that the translation, adaptation, sound or visual recording, reproduction, the transmission of an artistic work without the authorization of its author, which conflicts with the provisions of this law or the international conventions ratified by the Republic of Albania, when the author's moral and economic rights have been infringed, constitutes a criminal work and is penalized by fine or imprisonment up to one year. Whereas the Penal Code, as amended by the Law 7883 dated 24 January 2001, under Articles 147-149 underlines fines and imprisonment by up to four years for misappropriation of property through fraudulence by introducing a work of art and culture as the original or by changing the authenticity of the authorship; and fines and imprisonment by up to two years for partially or completely plagiarizing somebody else's work or for unauthorized reproduction of somebody's work. According to Article 82(4) of the Customs Code, the customs authorities upon request of the holder of a trademark or patent of production or other neighbouring rights specified in the Implementing Provisions of this Code, may prohibit their release in free circulation, the exportation, the re-exportation and their placing under the suspensive procedure of the goods that are recognized to be counterfeited or pirated goods, according to the procedure provided for in the Implementing Provisions of this Code. And the Implementing Provisions on Customs Code, Article 120(1) state that the General Directorate of Customs may suspend the release of the goods or seize the goods depending on the situation. The Code of Civil Procedure authorizes judges to order the payment of monetary damages adequate to compensate for the injury done. Article 68 of this Code states: "When a sum of money or a removable thing is requested the value is determined on the basis of the amount indicated or of the value declared by the plaintiff. In the absence of indication or of declaration, it is accepted that the determination of the value is a competence of the court". And any person has the right to claim compensation of costs and damages caused by the infringer. Under Article 106 it is stated among others: "In its final decision, the court charges the party whose lawsuit has been dropped, to pay the judicial expenses in conformity with article 102 of this Code including the payment for one advocate." Article 67 of the Law on Competition authorizes courts to impose fines not less than lek 10,000 and not more than lek 200,000 to any person or company who does not respect business secrets.

According to Article 348 of the Code Civil Procedure, all the cases of the infringement of the industrial property rights will be tried by the commercial section of the District Court of Tirana. In respect of this several seminars and training of judges and prosecutors are being planned in cooperation with WIPO and EPO.

Albanian legislation related to socio-economic development aims in general to the protection of the public health and nutrition. It takes care of the public interest and the general well-being. In Albania, the legislation on intellectual property is not dealing directly with the protection of the public health and nutrition. However, Article 3.7 of the Law on Industrial Property stipulates that no patents shall be granted in respect of essentially biological processes for the production of plants or animals, whereas in Article 40 it is stated : "Where the national security or public safety so requires, the Minister may authorize, even without the agreement of the owner of the patent or of the applicant, by notice published in the Official Journal, a government agency or a person designated in the said notice to make, use or sell an invention to which a patent or a patent application for a patent relates, subject to payment of equitable remuneration to the owner of the patent or the applicant." The Ministry of Agriculture and Food will improve the legislation to protect public health and nutrition by regulations, which will be in compliance with international standards, especially regulations dealing with genetically modified organisms. Several decisions of the Council of Ministers establish procedures for granting compulsory licenses on public interest grounds.

Albanian Law on Copyright (Law No. 7564, dated 19 May 1992 and its amendments) is in compliance with Articles 1-21 of the Berne Convention. Article 1 of this Law provides for the protection of the literary, artistic, public and other works including any original intellectual creation of this nature. The protection does not depend on the manner and form of expression, neither on the quality or the aim of the work. And it is not extended to ideas, procedures, processes, systems, ways of action, concepts, expressed principles or discoveries. Article 4 deals with moral rights stating that even if the economic rights have been transferred by his desire, the author has the right to: a) claim authorship of the work, especially the right to write his name on the copies of the work. When allowed by practice and in conformity with the tradition, his name may accompany his work mentioned in public; b) remain anonymous or use a pseudonym; c) object to any distortion, mutilation or modification and to other derogatory action in relation to his work, which would be prejudicial to his honour or reputation; d) object the joint authorship put in an arbitrary way from other persons because of different reasons. And Article 5 refers to economic rights stipulating that the author shall have the exclusive right of authorizing: a) the reproduction of the work; b) the importation of the work, with the purpose of its distribution (selling, leasing, renting, loaning) to the public; c) the translation of the work; d) the preparation of adaptations, alterations or other alterations of the work; e) the public recitation of the work; f) the communication of the work to the public by broadcasting and rebroadcasting; g) the communication of the work to the public by wire or other means.

Article 1 a) of the Law on Copyright, as amended by Law No. 8594 dated 6 April 2000 stipulates that this Law protects written works including computer programs whether in source or object code. Treating derived works and collections, Article 2 underlines that the same protection as to the works is applied to: a) translations, adaptations, arrangements, and other alterations of works and folkloric materials; b) collections of works, popular sayings or data and facts as encyclopaedias, anthologies and other sources of data which, by reason of the selection and arrangement of their contents constitute original creations. As regards economic rights, Article 5 of the Law states that the author of an audiovisual work, or any other work like phonograms, computer programs, databases and of any other work readable in machine, has the exclusive right to authorize giving on lease of his work.

Article 5 b) of Copyright Law stipulates that the author shall have the exclusive right of authorizing the importation of the work, with the purpose of its distribution (selling, leasing, renting, and loaning) to the public. And, further on: "the author of an audiovisual work, or any other work like phonograms, computer programs, databases, and of any other work readable in machine, has the exclusive right to authorize giving on lease of his work." Dealing with the producers of phonograms, Article 35 c) underlines that no one can lease or loan copy of the phonogram without the authorization of the producers of phonograms.

Article 34 of Law on Copyright provides for the protection of performers and states that no one can undertake the following acts without the authorization of the performers: 1. The broadcasting of their programmes, except for the cases when the programme consists of: a) a fixation of the performance, excluding the registration done according to the provisions of Article 39; b) a re-broadcasting authorized by the organization, which has broadcasted the programme for the first time. 2. The communication to the public of their performance, except for the cases when this performance consists of: a) the fixation of the programme; b) the broadcasting of the performance. 3. The fixation of the unfixed performance. 4. The reproduction of fixation of their performance in the following cases: a) when the performance is fixed before, without the authorization of the performers; b) when the reproduction is done for purposes other than those authorized by the performers; c) when the performance is first fixed in compliance with the provisions of Article 35, but the reproduction is done for purposes other than those defined in that article. In case of absence of a contractual agreement that provides otherwise or of absence of such employment conditions from which results the contrary: a) the authorization to broadcast does not mean authorization to grant license to other organizations for the broadcasting of the performance; b) the authorization for broadcasting does not mean authorization to fix the performance; c) the authorization for the fixation of the performance and the reproduction of the fixation does not mean the authorization to broadcast the performance; d) the authorization for broadcasting and fixing the performance does not mean authorization for reproduction and fixation. The provisions of the first and second paragraph, parts (c) and (d) are not applicable from the moment that the performers give the authorization to include their performance in a visual and audiovisual fixation. None of the paragraphs of this article takes off the right of the performers to sign contracts in more favourable conditions for their performances. In Article 35, which deals with the protection of the producers of phonograms, it is stated: Without the authorization of the producers of phonograms no one can: a) reproduce directly or indirectly the phonogram; b) import any copy of the phonogram; c) lease or loan copy of the phonogram. Treating the protection of broadcasting organizations, Article 37 underlines that no one can undertake the following acts without their authorization: 1) the re-broadcasting of their programmes; 2) the fixation of their programmes; 3) reproduction of the fixation of their programmes: (a) when the fixation on which bases a reproduction is done, is realized without the authorization of these organizations; or b) when the broadcasting is firstly fixed in accordance with the provisions of Article 39, but the reproduction is done for other purposes from those mentioned in that article.

Articles 6 to 16 and Article 38 deal with limitations of the economic rights of the author defining as lawful reproductions which are permitted without the authors approval and without payment or remuneration; the reproduction for personal use; that given in the form of citation; use for teaching; reproduction from libraries and archives with the purpose of storing or replacing of a copy, (in case of loss, damage etc); reproduction for legal and administrative purposes; for giving information; use of pictures of publicly exposed works; reproduction or adaptation of a computer program if this copy or adaptation is indispensable for the use of the computer program and for the purpose the program is legally obtained or if it is used for archives and if necessary (in case of loss, damage or overuse) to replace the legally obtained copy (the copy or the adaptation provided for in the first paragraph is destroyed in cases when the ownership of the copies of the computer programs is no longer legal); the reproduction of the code and the adaptation (upon some conditions) that are necessary to get the required data for the interaction of a computer program which is created independently of the other programs; recording for temporary use by a broadcasting organization and with its own means and the performance of a work during the activity of a school institution when it is prepared and listened by the staff.

According to Law No. 7923, dated 19 April 1995, Article 1, the terms of protection are as follows: Moral rights are protected permanently. Economic rights: - Copyright: the lifetime of the author and 70 years after his death. - Works of applied art: moral and economic rights protected for 25 years from the making of such works. - Rights of performers: 50 years, starting from the end of the year in which the performance has taken place. - Rights of producers of phonograms: 50 years, starting from the end of the year, in which the phonogram has been produced for the first time. - Rights of broadcasting organizations: 50 years, starting from the end of the year, in which the broadcasting has taken place.

The retroactive protection according to Article 18 of the Berne Convention is provided by Article 6 of Law No. 8594 dated 6 April 2000, which replaces Article 51 of the previous law and stipulates that: "the provisions of this law shall apply to works created before the moment this law came into force but have not yet fallen into the public domain through the expiry of the term of protection afforded under this law".

Article 73 of the "Law on Industrial Property" (1994) gives the definition of a sign and under what conditions it is protectable. According to this Article: 1. Any sign or any combination of signs capable of distinguishing the goods or services of one natural or legal person from those of another natural or legal person and of being represented graphically may serve as a mark for goods or a mark for services (hereinafter referred to as "mark"). 2. A collective trademark is a trademark registered by an industrial or commercial cooperation, or an association or the like organisation of several enterprises, and which is used in order to designate the goods and services of this association. Each enterprise of this association may also simultaneously, have its own trademarks. Particular provisions on collective trademarks are prescribed in specific articles of this Law, but in other cases, the provisions prescribed to trademarks also apply to collective trademarks. 3. The following signs may constitute a mark - words, including personal names, letters, numerals, abbreviations; - figurative signs, including devices, shapes of goods or of their packaging; - combinations of colours and shades of colours; - any combination of the signs referred to in items (a) to (c) of this Article. 4. Specific types of trademarks such as sound and light signals or other signs may be registered, if they can be graphically represented.

According to Article 73, paragraph 1 of the law any sign or any combination of signs capable of distinguishing the goods or services of one natural or legal person from those of another natural or legal person and of being represented graphically may serve as a mark for goods or a mark for services. In compliance with this paragraph, trade names are considered as signs and can be protected. And, as it is stated in Article 8 of Paris Convention, the Albanian Law on Industrial Property includes no provision that obliges the registration or the depositing of a trade name. Article 18 of the Law "On the Provisions that Regulate the First Part of the Commercial Code" sets forth that within one month from the day of the beginning of a commercial activity, the tradesman should announce his name and deposit his original signature at the court appointed to keep the commercial register. According to Article 73, paragraph 3 and 4, sounds and containers are also protectable (see the answer of question 1).

According to Article 92: 1) The registration of a mark may be revoked if the owner of the registered mark has not used it in connection with the goods or services referred to in the registration during a period of three years, without good reason (as amended by Law No. 8477, dated 22 April 1999). 2) A request to revoke the registration of a mark on the ground of the above-mentioned paragraph may be submitted to the Court by any interested party. The Court shall inform the Patent Office of its decision within 1 month from the date the decision is adopted. 3) A registration may not be revoked on the ground of paragraph 1 of this Article, in the case of any of the following uses of the registered mark in connection with the goods or services referred to in the registration: a) use made under a licence contract recorded in the register of marks; b) use of the mark in a modified form, which does not alter its distinctive character; c) use of the marks in publicity and business correspondence. 4) Any revoked registration shall cease to have effect on the date, which the revocation becomes effective. 5) The Patent Office shall record the revocation in the register of marks and publish the revocation of the mark and any other alteration made on the ground of this Article.

Yes, it is possible, according to Article 86 which states: 1) The registration of a trademark and service mark is made for 10 years counted from the filing date. 2) The application for the renewal of a registration contains the following elements: a) a request for the renewal of the registration; b) the name and the address of the owner of the registered mark; c) the date and the registration number of the registration concerned; d) the name and the address of the representative, if any; e) the names of goods and/or services grouped according to the International Classification of the Goods and Services, for which the renewal of the registration is sought; f) the signature of the owner of the registered mark or his representative, if any. 3) The registration of a mark may be renewed, on payment of the prescribed fee, for additional terms of 10 years.

Article 92, paragraph 3 a), b) and c) gives some requirements concerning the use of a trademark: A registration may not be revoked on the ground of paragraph (1) of this Article, in the case of any of the following uses of the registered mark in connection with the goods or services referred to in the registration: a) use made under a licence contract recorded in the register of marks; b) use of the mark in a modified form, which does not alter its distinctive character; c) use of the marks in publicity and business correspondence.