Councillors may be
interested in the following:
A decision was taken by
the WIPO Member States at their meeting from September 24 to October 3, 2001
to subject the Report of the
Second WIPO Internet Domain Name Process to a comprehensive analysis by
the Standing Committee on the Law of Trademarks, Industrial Designs and
Geographical Indications, which will meet in two Special Sessions for this
purpose.
The full text of the
decision reads as follows:
"... [T]he General
Assembly recognizes the significance of the issues examined in the Second
Process Report of the Second WIPO Internet Domain Name Process (The
Recognition of Rights and the Use of Names in the Internet Domain Name
System) (the Second Process Report) and stresses the political importance
that it attaches to those issues. It accordingly decides that:
1. "Two special sessions
of the Standing Committee on the Law of Trademarks, Industrial Designs and
Geographical Indications (SCT) should be held back-to-back with ordinary
sessions of the SCT. The two special sessions should be held within a period
of time that permits the circulation of a report on them to be transmitted to
the Member States in adequate time before the meetings of the Assemblies of
WIPO in September 2002;
2. "The two special
sessions should be devoted to a comprehensive analysis of the Second Process
Report, taking into account the specificities of the issues treated in that
Report and dealing with them on their own;
3. "The other work of the
SCT dealt with in ordinary sessions of the SCT should not interfere with the
consideration by the special sessions of the SCT of the issues in the Second
Process Report;
4. "A Report of the two
special sessions of the SCT should be prepared which presents the options for
the treatment of the issues dealt with in the Second Process Report,
indicating whether such issues are ripe for action, require further
discussion, are not sufficiently significant in their impact to require any
action or are not the subject of consensus. The Report of the two special
sessions should be transmitted to the meetings of the WIPO General Assembly in
September 2002 for consideration and decision."
Both Special Sessions
will be held in Geneva; the first from November 29 to December 4, 2001. The
dates for the second Special Session remain to be determined.
All working
documents of the Special Sessions will be made available to the public on
this website.
see: http://ecommerce.wipo.int/domains/index.html