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RR RUEHWEB

DE RUEHAM #0946/01 1130753
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 230753Z APR 09
FM AMEMBASSY AMMAN
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 4930
INFO RUEHGB/AMEMBASSY BAGHDAD 6231
RUEHLB/AMEMBASSY BEIRUT 3040
RUEHEG/AMEMBASSY CAIRO 4008
RUEHDM/AMEMBASSY DAMASCUS 4151
RUEHRH/AMEMBASSY RIYADH 2140
RUEHTV/AMEMBASSY TEL AVIV 1683
RUEHJI/AMCONSUL JEDDAH 0877
RUEHJM/AMCONSUL JERUSALEM 5488
RUCPDOC/DEPT OF COMMERCE WASHDC

UNCLAS AMMAN 000946 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR NEA/ELA AND EEB 
STATE PLEASE PASS TO USTR (GROVES, FRANCESKI) 
STATE PLEASE PASS TO USPTO (LEIFMAN, REVES) 
STATE PLEASE PASS TO LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: ECON ETRD KIPR SNAR JO
SUBJECT: JORDAN IPR UPDATE:  SOME PROGRESS IN REVISING LAWS AND 
STEADY ENFORCEMENT EFFORTS 
 
REFS: A) AMMAN 20 
       B) 08 AMMAN 2420 
 
¶1. (SBU) Summary: The Government of Jordan has continued its efforts 
to strengthen protection of intellectual property rights (IPR). 
Jordan's revised Copyright Law, updated to bring it into full 
compliance with the U.S.-Jordan Free Trade Agreement (FTA), has 
passed the Legislative and Opinion Bureau (LOB) review and will next 
move to the Cabinet before being submitted to Parliament.  The 
revised Customs Law which will give officials ex officio authority 
to seize goods and initiate criminal proceedings was recently 
submitted to the LOB.  The National Library has focused efforts on 
raids against electronics used to decode copyrighted material and 
has referred its first case of mobile phone piracy to the courts. 
Still, observers would like to see court sentencing strengthened for 
IPR cases.  The Jordan Food and Drug Administration says that 
smuggled drugs are now a larger problem than counterfeit drugs and a 
new hospital automation pilot project to better manage inventory 
seeks to prevent theft of medicines for resale.  The Public Security 
Directorate foiled a $14 million drug-smuggling attempt in March. 
End Summary. 
 
Two IPR Laws Move One Step Forward 
---------------------------------- 
 
¶2. (SBU) National Library (NL) Director General Mahmoun Talhouni 
told EmbOffs on April 7 that the Legislative and Opinion Bureau 
reviewed amendments to the Copyright Law that would to bring it into 
full compliance with the U.S.-Jordan Free Trade Agreement (FTA). 
Among the changes are amendments which clarified distinctions 
between ownership, authorship and subsistence; and prohibited the 
creation of anthologies of copyrighted works as textbooks (ref B). 
In the end, final revisions requested by LOB were modest, but 
required extensive discussions because of their technical nature. 
Talhouni said the law must now be reviewed by the Cabinet.  He was 
hopeful that the law would pass through Parliament relatively 
unchanged and commented that one of his strongest advocates is an 
Islamist Member of Parliament who is the author of two books. 
 
¶3. (SBU) Dr. Mohammed Alrhahleh, Regional Manager of the Arab 
Federation for the Protection of Intellectual Property (AFPIP), 
which is working closely with Jordan Customs (JC), told EconOffs on 
April 7 that the amendments to the Customs Law had been finalized 
within JC and had been forwarded to the LOB for review.  He said the 
most important change is the inclusion of Article 41 which will give 
customs officers ex officio authority to seize goods and initiative 
criminal proceedings.  He added AFPIP will be hosting a training 
session for customs officials in Aqaba on May 19 focused on 
enforcement. 
 
Government Reasserts Mandate to Use Legal Software 
--------------------------------------------- ----- 
 
¶4. (SBU) On March 9, the Prime Minister sent an annual letter to all 
ministries notifying them that all software used by the government 
must be licensed and not pirated in order for Jordan to be in 
compliance with its international treaties and bilateral agreements. 
 Hazem Malhas, CEO of Optimiza, Jordan's largest Information 
Technology (IT) company, said that IPR compliance is better for 
software than for other copyright categories, particularly DVDs and 
music.  Providing a software example, he said that while it was once 
common for Jordanian architects to use pirated AutoCAD software, 
this practice was now increasingly rare.  He said Microsoft and 
Oracle have sponsored innumerable IPR seminars for government and 
businesses to increase awareness of the need to use legal copies to 
ensure quality and updates, as well as to be in compliance with the 
law. 
 
National Library's Recent Focus on Electronics 
--------------------------------------------- - 
 
¶5. (SBU) Talhouni explained that Article 55 of the current Copyright 
Law bans the decoding of equipment or the import of equipment 
designed to decode copyrighted materials.  He said that a recent NL 
raid resulted in the seizure of 187 satellite boxes used to pirate 
satellite television feeds.  He said that at this point no store 
owner dares to put these devices on the shelf, but they remain 
 
available, often kept in back rooms.  He said the majority of the 
devices are smuggled from Dubai hidden as spare parts to other 
equipment. 
 
¶6. (SBU) The National Library also recently conducted a raid with 
the General Intelligence Department (GID) on a web-based pirated DVD 
service that allowed customers to order pirated DVDs online or via 
phone that were later delivered to the customers' homes.  NL also 
recently seized a computer being used to decode Apple iPhones so 
that the phones could be used with mobile phone service providers 
other than the lone authorized company.  This iPhone case has been 
referred to the courts and is the first Jordanian case of mobile 
phone piracy. 
 
Criticism of Courts' Role in Enforcement 
---------------------------------------- 
 
¶7. (SBU) Talhouni added that sentencing in Jordan needs to get 
stricter.  He said that sentencing done by the first instance courts 
has improved with additional judges focusing on IPR, more judges 
taking IPR training and the establishment of a specialized IPR 
court.  He added, however, that the first appeals court is not yet 
specialized and too often overturns IPR cases.  Alrhahleh agreed 
that the frequency of appeals is too high and said that the move 
away from arbitration proposed in the new Customs Law would 
exacerbate the problem since arbitration decisions are not 
appealable.  Talhouni further criticized the Jordanian law which 
allows defendants to pay a $127 fine in lieu of serving jail 
sentences of less than three months.  Talhouni is most eager for 
legal changes that would ease the process of permanently closing 
stores selling pirated goods.  He believes store closure is a better 
deterrent than fines or jail sentences.  He says there are 25 stores 
in Jordan that he believes should be permanently closed. 
 
Efforts to Fight Counterfeit and Smuggled Drugs 
--------------------------------------------- -- 
 
¶8. (SBU) Jordan Food and Drug Administration (JFDA) Director General 
Dr. Mohammed Rawashdeh said that multiple years of on-going raids on 
pharmacies have reduced the prevalence of counterfeit drugs in 
Jordan.  He reported that while the total number of raids has 
increased, the number of pharmacies closed for violations fell from 
171 in 2007 to approximately 60 in 2008 because fewer counterfeit 
drugs were found.  He noted the number of pharmacies convicted of 
selling counterfeit medicine fell from 63 in 2007 to 13 in 2008.  He 
expects similar low numbers in 2009.  He said that JFDA raids are 
now conducted until midnight and not just during business hours. 
 
¶9. (SBU) Rawashdeh commented the amount of smuggled and stolen 
drugs, however, remains high with the majority of the latter being 
stolen from the Ministry of Health's public hospitals and later 
re-sold in private pharmacies.  Ministry of Information and 
Communications Technology (MOICT) Secretary General Bashar Bashaireh 
said his ministry has launched a pilot project to improve hospital 
electronic record-keeping.  Project manager Steve Stratton of Perot 
Systems predicts that the greatest cost savings from this automation 
project will come from improved inventory management of medicines 
and reduced theft and re-selling. 
 
¶10.  Public Security Department (PSD) officials announced that they 
had foiled an attempt to smuggle 3.5 million counterfeit Captagon 
pills worth $14 million out of the country.  NOTE:  Captagon is the 
brand name of fenethylline, a banned synthetic drug used as a 
stimulant.  END NOTE.  Four Jordanians were arrested on March 23 for 
producing counterfeit versions of the legal drug and storing these 
pills in order to smuggle them abroad.  The suspects are now in 
custody and the case has been turned over to the State Security 
Court for prosecution.  In January, Jordan Customs also stopped an 
attempt to smuggle 39 kilograms of Captagon at one of the Syria 
border points.  Jordan is primarily viewed as a drug transit point 
and is not a large consumer or producer country (ref A). 
 
Visit Amman's Classified Website at 
http://www.state.sgov.gov/p/nea/amman 
 
BROWN