EUobserver.com: Music piracy breaks into global EU politics

EUobserver.com:

"In June at the G8 summit in St Petersburg, US president George Bush declined to clear Russian WTO membership on intellectual property grounds. Analysts linked the move to a later Russian threat to block US firms exploiting the Shtokman gas field in the Barents Sea, with potential delays on the project spelling later deliveries of liquid gas to Europe.

The formal conclusions of the EU-China summit in Helsinki on 10 September also recorded that 'leaders reiterated the importance of protecting intellectual property rights.' The same topic featured publicly in German chancellor Angela Merkel's meeting with Chinese leader Wen Jiabao in Beijing on 14 September.

'With the advent of the digital market, intellectual property is on the agenda. The US has seen this for a long time, the EU has just cottoned on now,' IFPI Europe head Frances Moore says. 'In the EU there was always a focus on the manufacturing base - it's time to look at the ideas side.'"