BERLIN/SOFIA |
BERLIN/SOFIA Feb 11 (Reuters) – Tens of thousands of
protesters took part in rallies across Europe on Saturday
against an international anti-piracy agreement they fear will
curb their freedom to download movies and music for free and
encourage Internet surveillance.
More than 25,000 demonstrators braved freezing temperatures
in German cities to march against the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade
Agreement (ACTA) while 4,000 Bulgarians in Sofia rallied against
the agreement designed to strengthen the legal framework for
intellectual property rights.
There were thousands more – mostly young – demonstrators at
other high-spirited rallies despite snow and freezing
temperatures in cities including Warsaw, Prague, Slovakia,
Bucharest, Vilnius, Paris, Brussels and Dublin.
“We don’t feel safe anymore. The Internet was one of the few
places where we could act freely,” said Monica Tepelus, a
26-year-old programmer protesting with about 300 people in
Bucharest.
Opposition to ACTA in Eastern Europe is especially strong
and spreading rapidly. Protesters have compared it to the Big
Brother-style surveillance used by former Communist regimes.
Downloading films and music is also a popular way for many young
Eastern Europeans to obtain free entertainment.
“Stop ACTA!” read a banner carried by one of the 2,000
marchers in central Berlin, where temperatures were -10 Celsius.
“It’s not acceptable to sacrifice the rights of freedom for
copyrights,” Thomas Pfeiffer, a leader of the Greens party in
Munich where 16,000 people protested against ACTA, was quoted
telling Focus magazine’s online edition on Saturday.
Governments of eight nations including Japan and the United
Stated signed an agreement in October aiming to cut copyright
and trademark theft. The signing was hailed as a step toward
bringing ACTA into effect.
Negotiations over ACTA have been taking place for several
years. Some European countries have signed ACTA but it has not
yet been signed or ratified in many countries. Germany’s Foreign
Ministry said on Friday it would hold off on signing.
In Sofia, most of 4,000 demonstrators on Saturday were
youths. Some wore the grinning, moustachioed Guy Fawkes masks
that have become a symbol of the hacker group Anonymous and
other global protest movements.
ACTA aims to cut trademark theft and tackle other online
piracy. But the accord has sparked concerns, especially in
Eastern European countries as well as in Germany which is
sensitive about its history with the Gestapo and Stasi secret
police, over online censorship and increased surveillance.
“We want ACTA stopped,” Yanko Petrov, who attended the rally
in Sofia, told state broadcaster BNT. “We have our own laws, we
don’t need international acts.”
SURVEILLANCE
The protesters are concerned that free downloading of movies
and music might lead to prison sentences if the ACTA was
ratified by parliaments. They also fear that exchanging material
on the Internet may become a crime and say the accord will allow
for massive online surveillance.
In Warsaw, some 500 protesters demonstrated, brandishing
placards saying “No to ACTA”, “Down with censorship” and “Free
Internet”. Several hundred turned out in the southwestern city
of Wroclaw, the Baltic port of Szczecin and Poznan.
In Paris, about 1,000 people marched ACTA. “It’s a
demonstration without precedent because it’s taking place in all
of Europe at the same time,” said Jeremie Zimmermann, spokesman
for Internet freedom group Quadrature du Net.
In Prague, about 1,500 people marched against ACTA. Some
waved black pirate flags with white skull and crossed bones, and
others wore white masks of the Guy Fawkes character.
Some carried banners against the ACTA treaty such as
“Freedom to the Internet” and “ACTA attacks Freedom”, and
chanted “Freedom, Freedom”. Smaller gatherings took place in
other Czech cities.
The Czech government has held off on ratification of the
ACTA treaty, saying it needs to be analysed.
Romanian state-news agency Agerpres said 2,000 people
protested in the Transylvanian city of Cluj against ACTA,
carrying banners that said: “Paws off the Internet.”
In Croatia, protests were held in Zagreb, Split and Rijeka,
with demonstrators, some masked, carrying banners reading “Stop
internet censorship”.
A group identifying itself as Anonymous hacked into the
webpage of Croatian president Ivo Josipovic, who has defended
copyright measures. It remained unavailable for several hours.
It also crashed the pages of ZAMP, a Croatian professional
service that looks after the protection of composers’ rights and
copyright, and the Institute of Croatian Music.
In Bratislava, hundreds of young Slovaks rallied, many also
wearing Guy Fawkes masks. About 1,000 people demonstrated in
Budapest.
Local media reported about 600 people protested at the
government building in Vilnius. Lithuania Justice Minister
Remigijus Simasius said in his blog some of ACTA’s provisions
could pose a threat to Internet freedom.
“I don’t know where it (ACTA) comes from and how it
originated, but I don’t like that this treaty was signed
skillfully avoiding discussions in the European Union and
Lithuania,” Simasius wrote.
(Additional reporting by Gerard Bon in Paris, Jan Lopatka in
Prague, Rob Strybel in Warsaw, Padraic Halpin in Dublin, Martin
Santa in Bratislava and Ioana Patran in Bucharest, Nerijus
Adomaitis in Vilnius, Zoran Radosavljevic in Zagreb, Krisztina
Than in Budapest; Editing by Alison Williams)
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