Chinaview.com reports that China has arrested 419 people suspected of trade mark infringement in the past five months. This information comes from Gao Feng, an official at the Ministry of Public Security (MPS), speaking last week at a press conference in Beijing on the State Office of Intellectual Property Protection. Since the beginning of Operation Eagle, a one-year campaign against trade mark infringement launched last November, more than 340 cases involving 100 million yuan (US$12 million) have been unearthed. According to Gao:
"Some 280 cases have been closed, with 419 suspects arrested and 30 million yuan (US$3.62 million) of economic losses recovered".
Apart from fake medicines, commodities seized in the campaign ranged from Toyota, Nissan and Mazda accessories, counterfeit Chanel and Boss cosmetics, household electronic appliances, clothing, tobacco and alcohol. Thirteen Chinese government departments, including the National Office of Rectification and Standardisation of Market Economic Order, the Ministry of Publicity, the MPS and the Ministry of Information Industry, plan to co-launch a campaign during Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) Protection Week from April 20 to 26 in an effort to enhance the IPR awareness of the public and to fend off counterfeit products.
Operation Eagle: clipping the wings of China's infringers
The IPKat thinks this is a small step in the right direction, but Merpel wonders if this is just a cosmetic exercise for foreign consumption. China does not exactly operate a free market economy. If infringers are operating on a large scale, how often is it with the connivance or cooperation of the State and its many organs?
Other Operation Eagles here and here
Operation Eagle Claw here; Operation Eagle Eye here
