European Court of Justice to rule on controversial anti-piracy scheme

Commissioners refer the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement to Europe's top court

The European Commission has asked the European Court of Justice (ECJ) to determine whether the controversial Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) conflicts with fundamental EU policies on freedom of expression, data protection and intellectual property.

The referral has the backing of Justice Commissioner Vivienne Reding.

ACTA doesn't introduce any new intellectual property (IP) laws, but aims to strong-arm European-style IP protection on countries outside the EU. The US, Japan and Australia have signalled support.

Inevitably, the agreement has suffered a troubled passage, attracting fierce criticism from freedom of speech lobbyists and groups opposed to perpetuating what they see as draconian IP laws.

The European Council adopted ACTA unanimously in December 2011 and passed it to national governments for ratification.

But so far not all 27 EU member states have ratified ACTA. The UK, France, Spain and Italy are among those that have.

Germany and Poland have backed out, saying they didn't fully understand the implications. Other member states are still deciding.

A decision by the ECJ will clear up the confusion, argues Commissioner Karel De Gucht, who proposed ACTA's referral to the Court.

"This debate must be based on facts and not on the misinformation or rumour that has dominated social media sites and blogs in recent weeks," De Gucht said in his statement to the Council.

"A referral will allow for Europe's top court to independently clarify the legality of this agreement."

"ACTA will not change anything in the European Union... [it] will change nothing about how we use the internet and social websites today," he argues.

"What counts for us is getting other countries to adopt them so that European companies can defend themselves against blatant rip-offs of their products... it will help protect jobs that are currently lost because counterfeited and pirated goods worth €200bn are floating around on the world markets."