Free Trade and Copyright Law vs.

Freedom of Expression in Colombia

Dan Gordon

University of Arizona
Free Trade and Copyright Law vs. Freedom of Expression in Colombia 1

Colombia is home to the longest-running armed conflict in the Western

Hemisphere. Since the 1960s the Colombian government, backed with military

support from the United States, has been engaged in a bloody conflict against a

handful of leftist guerilla groups. The two major remaining groups, the

Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and the National Liberation Army

(ELN) have engaged in peace talks with the Colombian government over the last

decade, but none has resulted in a lasting peace. The main victims of this conflict,

however, are civilians who are caught between the two armed factions-leaving

Colombia with the worlds highest level of internally displaced persons (Garcia

2009).

It is in this environment of war that freedom of expression, while protected

by Colombian law and the countrys Constitution, often exists only in name. In 2012

the Colombian media watchdog Foundation for Freedom of the Press (FLIP)

collected 158 incidents of direct attacks on journalists. (Fundacin para Libertad de

Prensa 2012). Not only journalists, but average citizens walk a fine line in

attempting not to incur the wrath of one of the many armed groups operating the

region, whether they be guerillas, the military, paramilitaries, or criminal gangs. In

recent years, revelations of the Colombian state working closely with paramilitaries

to eliminate political opponents, human rights activists, and trade unionists have

also emerged (Fritz 2010).

In such an environment the openness and anonymity of the Internet is even

more crucial as a tool for citizens to be able to express themselves. Despite

widespread inequality and a mountainous geography that limits access to many

Free Trade and Copyright Law vs. Freedom of Expression in Colombia 2

forms of communication, 60 percent of Colombians have access to the Internet

(internetworldstats.com). The country is now the fastest-growing Internet market

in Latin America (newmediatrendwatch.com).

But the freedom and relative openness of the Internet does not necessarily

mean that Internet users in Colombia will have access information that is relevant to

their lives. As corporate interests become further entrenched in cyberspace,

copyright law is becoming more and more frequently wielded as tool that favors the

rights of the corporation over the individual. According to Colombian scholar

Ignacio Fernandez Internet has opened the door to the possibility of absolute

control on the part of the rights holders of intellectual property. They have

exercised a considerable pressure in all spheres with the objective of reducing to the

minimum the variety of conducts that remain outside of their sphere of control.

(Fernandez Diaz 2003).

The Colombian Constitution, in comparison with the U.S. Constitution, grants

an even larger amount of rights for freedom of expression. Article 20 of the

countrys 1991 Constitution not only gives every citizen the freedom to express

their thoughts and opinions, but also grants them the right to transmit and receive

information that is true and impartial. This includes the right for every Colombian

to establish mass communications media. Furthermore, it claims that there will

be no censorship and stresses that mass media have a social responsibility.

Article Four of the constitution notes that in every case of incompatibility with the

constitution, constitutional rulings will be applied (Constitution Finder).

Free Trade and Copyright Law vs. Freedom of Expression in Colombia 3

The country, however, is also bound by international agreements that affect

copyright law. Many of these agreements predate the 1991 Constitution. With each

subsequent agreement that is passed laws are being strengthened to add

increasingly harsh penalties to those who violate intellectual property laws. These

draconian measures, pushed through at the urging of the Western governments and

corporations, are coming to limit Colombians abilities to exercise their

constitutional rights of freedom of communication.

The earliest international treaty on copyright to which Colombia belongs to

is the 1886 Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works,

which Colombia signed in 1988. This treaty was drawn up during the height of the

British empire, and according to British lecturer on intellectual property Alan Story

The current copyright laws which have been established in many countries in the

global south were-and still are-very similar to the rules of their former colonial

masters (Story 2009). The Berne Convention is also noteworthy because it is the

first example of copyright, a foreign European invention, being imposed on the

developing world. The recent free trade agreements (FTAs) between the U.S.,

Canada, the European Union and Colombia all have their roots in this 1886 treaty.

The Berne convention granted any nation that signed on to the treaty the

ability to grant more rights-but not less rights-to any holder of intellectual property

rights. In other words, this treaty, which has served as the model for every

copyright treaty that followed, began by tipping the scale in favor of rights holders

over the general public. It lists over 30 categories of protected works including

works of art, novels, and recipes. The treaty also sets a minimum of the life of the
Free Trade and Copyright Law vs. Freedom of Expression in Colombia 4

author plus 50 years as the minimum amount of time that copyrights must protect

many of these works. This treaty, however, makes no exceptions for copyrighted

material that is out of print or has transferred to another owner at the time of the

original authors death.

The result of the Bern Convention and the free trade agreements it has given

rise to has led to growing limitations on the ability of average Colombians to use

information and communications technology. A focus on protecting the profits of

copyright holders has led to a situation in which a means to legally own

communications tools is priced out of reach for Colombian citizens.

To illustrate this point, it is helpful to look at a study by researcher Rishab

Ghoush, who has charted the GDP of the worlds countries against the average cost

of licensing the Windows Office XP Suite-the most profitable word processing

software in the world. By examining these licensing fees worldwide, it becomes

apparent that the fees charged by Microsoft in each country have no relation to the

wealth or poverty of a country, but instead have more to do with the intellectual

property rules governing the country. Citizens in many countries that are relatively

poorer than the United States must pay more (when converted to U.S. dollars) than

Americans to license the same software.

For example, in 2001 Colombias GDP per capita was $1,915, compared to

$35,277 in the United States. While the Windows Suite cost $560 in the U.S., it cost

the equivalent of $10,316 in Colombia. This means that the average Colombian

would have had to work 3.5 months longer than a U.S. citizen to be able to afford to

license the same software (Ghoush 2003).

Free Trade and Copyright Law vs. Freedom of Expression in Colombia 5

Another international group that regulates copyright law in Colombia is the

Community of Andean Nations (CAN). The CAN was formed in 1969 with the

signing of the Cartagena Agreement by Bolivia, Colombia, Chile (which withdrew

from the initiative in 1976), Ecuador, and Peru. Venezuela also joined in 1973 but

later withdrew in 2011. In 1993 the CAN adopted Decision 351 which set out a

framework for all of the nations to follow regarding copyrights. Decisions made by

the CAN have immediate effect and prevail over national law. In addition, Colombian

law goes above and beyond the standards dictated by the CAN (Garvito and

Rodriguez 2005). In terms of criminal sanctions for copyright infringement,

however, Decision 351 left these decisions in the hands of national governments.

The decision of Colombia and the other Andean nations to join the CAN also

smoothed the way for these countries to later enter into the WTO because of the

similarity between the treaty and the WTOs Treaty on Intellectual Property Rights

(TRIPS).

The decision for Venezuela to leave the CAN in 2011, however, is a reminder

of the conflict that emerges between free trade agreements and national or regional

laws. Former Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez claimed that, according to CAN

guidelines, member states must first take into consideration the effects that free

trade agreements with other countries would have on other CAN nations before

signing agreements with Western nations. According to Venezuela, if individual

countries like Colombia lowered their standards for U.S. imports it would negatively

affect the ability of the Andean countries to negotiate as a whole. Venezuelas

Free Trade and Copyright Law vs. Freedom of Expression in Colombia 6

departure from the CAN foretold some of the current conflicts between local and

regional law and international treaties that are now surfacing in Colombia.

In 2006 the U.S. and Colombia signed a mutual FTA. Due to the international

concerns that this treaty would reward Colombia for widespread human rights

violations, the treaty did not come into effect until May of 2012. Colombia and Peru

also signed a FTA with Canada that took effect in 2011. At the present, the European

Union (EU) is negotiating the closure of a FTA between Peru and Colombia.

The major intellectual property concerns many Latin Americans have

expressed over these FTAs have been over the new regulations they would impose

to protect the patents of pharmaceutical companies, effectively preventing cheaper

generic drugs from gaining access to Latin American markets. Research data by

pharmaceutical companies on developing drugs is protected by patent law for five

years, meaning that companies wanting to provide generic alternatives will not have

access to this data and have to repeat the same costly studies themselves. In 2011

tens of thousands of Colombians took to the streets in a massive demonstration

against the FTA to challenge the intellectual property rights regime it forced upon

the Colombian people. Protesters were also felt the treaty would cause the state

and its allied paramilitary groups to increase their already deadly attacks on the

countrys labor movement as FTA incentives spurred more foreign investment in

the country (Nicaragua Solidarity Network 2011). This was the culmination of

many years of protest in both Colombia and the United States (Poole 2009). Despite

these efforts, however, the treaty was signed by U.S. President Barak Obama with

little attention in the mainstream U.S. press.

Free Trade and Copyright Law vs. Freedom of Expression in Colombia 7

The concern raised by many Colombians over the patenting of traditional

indigenous plants and pharmaceuticals under the FTA has, to some degree,

overshadowed some of the other changes the treaty demands for intellectual

property rights in the country. The FTA also introduced the same copyright scheme

as in the United States-extending the terms of copyright to the life of the author plus

80 years, extending the penalties for the unauthorized posting of copyrighted

material on the Internet (without providing for any type of fair use), and copying

the anti-preventative measures of the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act

(Universidad de Palermo).

The passage of the U.S./Colombia FTA was a signal from the U.S. business

community that decades of scorched earth policies from the Colombian government

were beginning to provide the minimum amount of stability needed for these firms

to begin extracting wealth from the country in new ways. A 2011 report by the U.S.

Commercial Service titled Intellectual Property Rights Toolkit: Colombia is

illustrative of these trends. The report raises Colombias relatively stable political

environment and government policies that, over the past decade, have dramatically

improved security (U.S. Commercial Service 2011). It also claims that, due to the

supposed success of Plan Colombia, drug traffickers have now turned to copyright

piracy and counterfeit products. The document gives a green light for the

Colombian government to treat supposed violators of intellectual property rights in

the same matter is treats subversives.

This rhetoric from the U.S. ignores the fact that Colombia has one of the

regions lowest software piracy rates (54%) in comparison with the Latin American
Free Trade and Copyright Law vs. Freedom of Expression in Colombia 8

average (64%) (Business Software Alliance 2011). This has not stopped industry

leaders from painting piracy as a major threat to the country. In 2010 Microsofts

global anti-piracy chief Keith Beeman travelled to Colombia and announced, without

providing any evidence, that the countrys software pirates were tied to organized

crime, money laundering, and kidnapping (Stone 2010). While there may be some

amount of crossover between these groups, it is a dangerous generalization to claim

that vendors of pirated CDs are in the same category as armed groups and drug

smugglers. In a country where mere rumors that one is a affiliated with any armed

faction are enough to cause one to disappear, statements like those made by

Beeman could provide the pretext the Colombian government needs to violently and

illegally crack down on anyone it claims is violating intellectual property rights.

The report by the U.S. Commercial Service also lauds the FTA as the best

mechanism to secure intellectual property, warning that the Colombian government

will need to pass new laws to comply with these goals. The authors of this report,

however, could not have predicted the speed at which the Colombian government

would implement sweeping changes to intellectual property law in order to comply

with the FTA.

The following year Colombian Minister of Justice and the Interior, German

Vargas Lleras presented Bill 201 to the Colombian Congress. The law was fast-

tracked through Congress on April 13th, 2012 in order to be passed before President

Obama visited the country for the Summit of the Americas.

This bill, which was quickly dubbed the Lleras Law, stated that Colombias

Internet service providers (ISPs) would be responsible for policing the content of
Free Trade and Copyright Law vs. Freedom of Expression in Colombia 9

the Internet, which meant blocking access to material if the rights holder claimed

their copyright was violated. ISPs that refused to comply would risk fines and

prosecution. In addition, the Lleras Law criminalized the transmission of TV signals

over the Internet. And while the FTA only provided that willful violators of these

copyright laws be published, the new law went above and beyond the international

treaty by attempting to criminalize those who were unaware of the illegality of their

own actions (Rossini and Botero 2012).

To those who are utilizing piracy, youre going to have to leave that behind,

Vargas had told a press conference a year earlier. because from here on out prison

and penalties are going to be strictly applied (Castillo 2012).

The idea of holding ISPs responsible for the actions of Internet users is based

on similar bills that were floated by U.S. lawmakers and later defeated amidst

widespread protest. The text of the Lleras Law can borrows much of its content

from the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the Protect IP Act (PIPA), U.S. bills that

were proposed in Congress and defeated after a surge of citizen opposition (Ars

Technica Staff 2012).

According to Colombian lawyer and journalism professor Carlos Corts

Castillo, the most relevant characteristic of the Lleras Law is that it sets up an

extra-judicial mechanism...It doesnt require a judge during the process of reviewing

the content. The process is carried out mainly between the rights holder and the

ISP. This isnt the only model available; in many countries theyve opted for

administrative measure, judicial measures, or a mixture of both (Castillo 2012).

Free Trade and Copyright Law vs. Freedom of Expression in Colombia 10

Castillo added that neither the rights holder nor the ISP had enough legal standing

to determine whether or not copyright law is being broken.

The Lleras Law resulted in widespread condemnation from Colombians

dedicated to preserving Internet freedoms. The following month after it was

proposed Colombian senator Jorge Robledo filed a lawsuit against the law in the

countrys Constitutional Court, claiming that it violated freedom of expression by

putting an onerous burden of proof on Internet users to show that material they

posted was cleared by the rights holders (El Tiempo 2012).

One of the less-discussed aspects of the Lleras Law was the provisions of the

bill that clearly seemed to favor foreign media over locally-produced news. Article

21 of the bill reduced the requirement that television stations air 50 percent

government-produced weekend programming to 30 percent. Other Colombian

bloggers remarked that the bill would have a negative effect on community radio,

which they claimed already must deal with high costs for leasing the state-owned

radio spectrum and licensing the rights to their music (elquepiensagana.com 2012)

In November of 2011, seven months after the Lleras law was brought before

the Colombian Congress, the Senate tabled the bill (Global Censorship Chokepoints

2011). Another law, Bill 1520 or Llleras 2.0 was quickly proposed which limited

the scope of the previous bill.

According to Colombian intellectual property lawyer Carolina Botero, This

bill only reinforces the rights in favor of the rights holders and and doesnt leave any

balance, it almost exclusively leaves out a process for blocking content, and it
Free Trade and Copyright Law vs. Freedom of Expression in Colombia 11

modifies the civil as well as the legal frameworks..It changes definitions that arene

being discussed or didnt even exist (Publimetro 2012).

In January of 2013 the Constitutional Court of Colombia struck down the bill.

The law, however, was struck down because of legal technicalities in the way the bill

was passed, leaving the door open for a similar bill to be pushed through the

Congress in the future. The court ruled the law unconstitutional because it was

passed as an international treaty, rather than a statutory law.

The pressure under the FTA to pass such bills overlooks the fact that

Colombia has already been working to strengthen copyright law for several years.

The first major copyright law passed by the Colombian Congress was Law 23

(1982), which set up a legal framework for copyright that, like the United States,

lasted for the lifetime of an author plus 80 years. Law 44 (1993) amended this law

to allow for copyright holders to create non-profits to administer their intellectual

property.

Law 1032 (2006) imposed a severe prison sentence of four to eight years for

violators of copyrights (World Intellectual Property Organization). According to

Colombian scholar What this punitive measure showed is that penal law has been

converted into the preferred instrument for the manufacturing industry in

developing countries (Garcia ).

In 1998, in accordance with Plan Colombia, Colombian President Andres

Pastrana began implementing a series of measures to strengthen copyright law in

Colombia. In 2007 the country began working at a national level to educate

Colombian society in order to generate a culture of respect towards intellectual

Free Trade and Copyright Law vs. Freedom of Expression in Colombia 12

property right protection. However, it was not until the election of President

Santos in 2010 that Colombias National Development Plan, for the first time, began

to tackle the issue of intellectual property rights (IPR Toolkit 2011).

Attempts by Colombians to change copyright law

According to Colombian media scholar Carolina Botero in countries like

Colombia legal boundaries of copyright are meaningless because in daily practice

sharing and spreading knowledge is norm and thus taken for granted (Botero

2007). She adds that educators and librarians frequently

In April of 2013 a public debate was held over Law 001 of 2012. While

claiming to protect the right to use intellectual property for parody, the actual

wording of the law restricts the use of parody to the point of making it illegal for all

practical purposes:

The transformation of artistic or literary works is permitted only if they are

carried out for the purpose of parody and do not imply the risk of confusion with the

original work, if it does not affect the moral law of integrity of the author, nor cause

an unjustified damage to the legitimate interests of the author or affect the normal

use of the work

The issue of copyright law in Colombia, often overshadowed by larger issues

in the country of war and drug trafficking, has also become more prominent in

recent years due to scandals within the countrys national copyright office. In late

2012 the Colombian Performance Rights Organization (SAYCO) was embroiled in a

scandal that led to the resignation of both its manager and the head of the countrys
Free Trade and Copyright Law vs. Freedom of Expression in Colombia 13

Copyright Office. In the aftermath of the scandal the government decided to take

control of SAYCO and address the issue of copyright rights management with a new

law, Draft Law 202, which is still under discussion in the Coombian Congress.

The

The Colombian NGO Redpatodos (Internet for All) has lobbied for a change to this

law

One of the ways in which intellectual property laws have, to some degree,

acted as a straitjacket to prevent access to information is the case of inter-library

loans in the country. This has recently been in the media due to the involvement of

Colombias most famous author, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, and his 2004 book

Memories of my Melancholy Whores (Melo 2005). The case also shows that

Decision 351s vagueness has left Colombian lawmakers room to interpret the law

to favor rights holders.

Free Trade and Copyright Law vs. Freedom of Expression in Colombia 14

Fernando Zapata, director of the Colombian Copyright Office, declared that

because the decision did not specifically exempt libraries from copyright provisions,

no library in Colombia could lend out copies of a book without express permission

of the author.

Article 16.7.4b

As points out, while copyrighted works eventually will revert to the public domain,

the technology that keeps copyrighted material from being distributed, such as

password-protected software, has no expiration date. It is not an exaggeration

then, writes .that technological measures will be become barriers that impede the

access to knowledge that is not covered by intellectual property rights and is found

in the public domain ( Garcia )

11 GDP per capita in Colombia was $7,104 per capita, compared to $48,112 in the

United States.
Free Trade and Copyright Law vs. Freedom of Expression in Colombia 15

Copyright law governing Latin America goes back to the 1886 Bern Convention, a
treaty drawn up by the colonial European powers to govern countries that were
emerging from its colonial grasp. In 1889 Latin American nations signed the
Montevideo Treaty, an alternative document that allowed more relaxed copyright
standards for these developing nations.

Nations listed as developing can apply to the World International Property

Organizations (WIPO) for licenses that cover translating and distributing material
written in foreign languages for educational use.

This led to the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) in 20

Plants and animals are treated as genetic material, paving the way for further
patenting of living organisms.

If a publisher prints works that are in the public domain in one country, can he be

assured that they are also in the public domain if he tries to export them to another

country?

ACTA was meant to address commercially orientated counterfeiting and piracy

rather than the artist, student, or educator that occasionally appropriates

copyrighted material for their use.

Creative Commons Colombia was born in 2006. One example is Noisradio, a project

of the School of Communication of the Universidad del Valle. Another project,

Cartografias Sonoras, provides an online sound and image bank of marketplaces,

and notable urban areas in Colombia, to which users can freely upload or download

material. There is also the Revista Colombiana de Biotecnologia (Colombian

Free Trade and Copyright Law vs. Freedom of Expression in Colombia 16

Magazine of Biotechnology) which uses a creative commons license for both its

electronic and print versions. (Rivas)

In November of 2006 trade ministers from both the U.S. and Colombia signed the

treaty.

Since 2008 the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) has

funded the Colombian government to update and digitalize thousands of patents

and trademarks.

In 2002, Decree 2085 was issued to regulate the protection of safety and efficacy

test data for pharmaceuticals.

the Center for Research on Latin America and the Caribbean (CERLAC)19 stated that

53 % of the products sold in 2007 in this sector were pirated

Decree 1070 on April 7, 2008, acknowledging the need to promote research;

cultural diffusion; to safeguard the copyright, and to protect interests of owners and

users of works protected by copyright.22

Program for the Defense and Rights of Producers, Exhibitors and Distributors of

Video in Colombia (PRACI), over five million copies of illegal movies were seized in

2007. Additionally, approximately 602 illegal video shops were raided that year
Free Trade and Copyright Law vs. Freedom of Expression in Colombia 17

According to a 2010 study by the Business Software Alliance, Colombia has the

lowest software piracy rate (54%) in Latin America.

UNIVERSIDAD DE PALERMO

Aarronson and townes

The EU has not added language that provides for the free flow of information in its
FTAs, while the Canadian government has.

Canada has a similar form of fair use which it calls fair dealing. Fair dealing has
broad exemptions for education and parody, and it has been ruled in favor of in
many Canadian court cases. Canadian courts view teachers, as well as ISPs, as
conduits of information In general, Canada does not include intellectual property
rights language in its FTAs

Lander, Edgardo. Modelos alternativos de integracin: Proyectos neoliberales y

resistencias populares. Revista Foro. Aug. 2005.

Rivas, Angela Maria Cardona. El copyleft y las licensias Creative Commons en la

industria editorial. Universidad de Antioquia. Medillin, Colombia. June 2010.

Aaronson, S., & Townes, M. (2012). Can Trade Policy Set Information Free?.
Available at SSRN 2189153.

Ars Technica Staff. Week in tech:SOPA defeated, Megaupload taken down. Ars
Technica. Web. 21 Jan. 2012. http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/01/week-
in-tech-sopa-defeated-megaupload-taken-down/
Free Trade and Copyright Law vs. Freedom of Expression in Colombia 18

Castillo, Carlos Corts. El debate pendiente en Colombia sobre la proteccion de

derechos de autor en Internet . El caso de la Ley Lleras. http://karisma.org.co/wp-
content/uploads/2013/04/Paper1ElCasoLeyLlerasResumen.pdf

Constitution Finder at the University of Richmond

<http://confinder.richmond.edu/admin/docs/colombia_const2.pdf>

Eduteka (2002). Limitaciones o exepciones al derecho de autor.

http://www.eduteka.org/modulos.php?catx=1&idSubX=162&ida=124&art=1

Fundacion Karisma (2013). Letter to Stanford K. McCoy, Assistant U.S. Trade

Representative for Intellectual Property and Innovation. http://karisma.org.co/wp-
content/uploads/2013/02/Karsima-letter-Docket-2012-0022-0001.pdf

Fernandez Diaz, Ignacio Garrote (2003). El derecho de autor en Internet.

Garavito, Csar Rodrguez and Franco, Diana Rodrguez. Es constitucional el TLC?

Revista Foro.

Garcia, Ernesto Rengifo. Un nuevo reto del derecho en la edad de la informacin.

Garca, G. N. P. (2009). Las FARC: Su origen y evolucin.. UNISCI Discussion Papers,

(19), 154-184.
http://ezproxy.library.arizona.edu/login?url=http://search.proquest.com/docview
/748432147?accountid=8360

Ghoush, Rishab Aiyer (2003). License Fees and GDP per

capita: The case for open source in developing countries. First Monday 8(12).
http://firstmonday.org/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/
1103/1023

Melo, Jorge Orlando (2005). Leer en biblioteca: Derecho o concesion? Boletin

Interno de la Biblioteca Luis Angel Arango.
http://www.jorgeorlandomelo.com/leer_en_biblioteca.htm

Nicaragua Solidarity Network (2011). Weekly News Update on the Americas

#1075: Colombians protest FTA, privatization. 12 Apr. 2011. Web.
Free Trade and Copyright Law vs. Freedom of Expression in Colombia 19

http://weeklynewsupdate.blogspot.com/2011/04/wnu-1075-colombians-protest-
fta.html

Olivia, Maria Julia (2003). Intellectual Property in the FTAA: Little Opportunity and
Much Risk. American University International Law Review 19(1).

Publimetro. Carolina Botero: Es peor que la Ley Lleras. Publimetro.co. 21 Mar.

2012. http://www.publimetro.co/lo-ultimo/carolina-botero-es-peor-que-la-ley-
lleras/lmklcu!t6jhPJW1lopos/

Ramirez, Antonio (2007). An introduction to Colombian governmental institutions

and primary legal sources. Globalex.
Web.http://www.nyulawglobal.org/globalex/colombia.htm

Garcia, Ernesto Rengifo (2008). Un nuevo reto del derecho en la edad de la

informacin. Universidad Externado de Colombia, Vol. 12.
http://revistas.uexternado.edu.co/index.php/propin/article/view/626

Rossini, Carolina and Botero, Carolina. Copyright in Latin America: New

Enforcement Measures Pose Major Threats to Internet Users in Panama and
Colombia. Electronic Frontier Foundation. Web. 28 Sept. 2012.

Stone, Hannah. Microsoft: Software Piracy Tied to Narco-Trafficking. Colombia

Reports. 13 May 2010. Web. http://colombiareports.com/colombia-
news/news/9699-microsoft-software-piracy-tied-to-narco-trafficking.html

Eltiempo.com. Corte Constitucional Admite Demandas Contra la llamada Ley Lleras

2.0 Web. 05 Jun. 2012.

Colombia: Emisoras comunitarias tienden a desaparacer.

Elquepiensagana.bligoo.com.co . Web. 21 Sept. 2012.
http://elquepiensagana.bligoo.com.co/colombiaemisoras-comunitarias-tienden-a-
desaparecer

Universidad de Palermo. La tension entre la proteccin de la propriedad

intellectual y el intercambio de contenidos en la red a proposito del caso Cuevano en
Argentina y la Ley Lleras en Colombia. Centro de Estudios en Libertad de

World Intellectual Property Organization: Colombia Laws

http://www.wipo.int/wipolex/en/profile.jsp?code=CO

Expresin y Acceso a la Informacin (CELE) de la facultad de Derecho de la

Universidad de Palermo, Argentina.
Free Trade and Copyright Law vs. Freedom of Expression in Colombia 20

Poole, Deborah A. The Minga of Resistance: Policy Making from Below. NACLA
Report on the Americas 42 (1): Jan/Feb 2009.

http://www.newmediatrendwatch.com/regional-overview/104-latin-america

http://www.coha.org/a-legal-wasteland-%E2%80%93-lawyers-murder-
democracy-and-justice-in-colombia/

The free trade agreements between Colombia and Western nations, however, have

been more controversial because of the changes they seek to enact in intellectual

property law. The most contentious of these has been the Free Trade Agreement of

the Americas (FTAA) which was designed to be a massive free-trade zone stretching

from Canada to the tip of Argentina in which all protective tariffs and laws designed

to protect local industries could eventually be whittled away to zero. The delegates

were in agreement that by January 01, 2005 the FTAA would be ratified throughout

the hemisphere. The delegates representing the agreements, however, found it

increasingly difficult to carry out the plan as it was met with massive international

resistance in Quebec City (2001), Buenos Aires, Quito, and Miami. Alongside

citizen resistance, a major stumbling block to the FTAA was the resistance of the

more powerful countries in South America-Brazil, Venezuela, and Argentina-which

were opposed to eliminating their subsidies to national agriculture. By 2003 the

project was unofficially shelved and the strategy switched to carving out individual

countries and regions throughout Latin America for separate free trade deals

(Lander 2005).

The separate free trade agreements between Colombia and the western

nations were the result of the failure of a much larger agreement, the Free Trade
Free Trade and Copyright Law vs. Freedom of Expression in Colombia 21

Agreement of the Americas (FTAA). Critics of the FTAA and the free trade

agreement that followed claim that these agreements hamper the ability of

developing countries like Colombia to set their own public policy objectives by

denying them the flexibility needed to set up their own intellectual property rights

systems. While the Treaty on Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) had allowed WTO

member countries some flexibility in their pursuit of copyright programs, the FTAA

set stricter standards for countries to follow. For example, TRIPS had allowed for

compulsory licensing, which gave governments the right to use protected

intellectual property in certain cases for public policy reasons. The FTAA, however,

limited the use of these licenses to extreme emergencies (Olivia 2003).

88888888888888888888

Colombia, unlike the United States, Canada, and England, has a legal system based in
civil law, rather than common law (Ramirez 2007). This means that, while
Colombian courts have ruled on matters regarding copyright law, these decisions
only affect the outcome of the case and do not become the law of the land. Rather
than look to the courts on decisions involving copyright law, Colombia relies on a
series of laws passed by its Congress.