The first six months of 2012 saw Europeans taking to the streets in order to kill off ACTA in the European Union. Against all the odds, they succeeded in that aim, as the European Parliament voted to reject ACTA on 4 July last year. That defeat has certainly been burned into the memories of Karel de Gucht, the EU Commissioner responsible for negotiating first ACTA and now TAFTA/TTIP. […]
This raises an interesting question. At the moment, the EU-Singapore FTA has only been « initialled »: that means it must still be approved by the European Commission, the Council of Ministers representing the member nations, and the European Parliament. So will the EU’s MEPs reject the new trade agreement because it represents ACTA by the backdoor — or at least a part of it? That seems unlikely.
But if the European Parliament does pass the EU-Singapore FTA, de Gucht might then argue that the same sections from ACTA can now be pasted into TAFTA/TTIP, since they are no longer problematic. And if he does so, perhaps he will be tempted to include a few more sections from ACTA, on the grounds that he is doing nothing « by the backdoor », but doing it in the full view of everyone….
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20131022/07350824965/eu-acta-is-dead-long-live-acta.shtml