Patent directive adoption just days away

An EU Council spokeswoman said on Monday that the Computer Implemented Inventions Directive (CIID), which many say will allow widespread software patenting in Europe, is likely to be ratified on 31 January.

"What I can tell you now is that it is most probable that the point [the CIID] will be on the agenda of the External Relations Council which will take place next Monday, 31 January," said the spokeswoman.

The software patent directive was expected to be ratified this week. This was postponed after an intervention from the Polish government, according to sources familiar with the process who say the Polish body responsible for making decisions on European affairs, Komitet Europejski Rady Ministrow, asked the EU Presidency not to put the directive on Monday's agenda.

But the EU Council spokeswoman denied that the patent directive was ever scheduled to be adopted this week.

Poland said it needs more time to complete its work on the directive so it can decide what its final position will be, according to a Polish government statement that has been translated by the Foundation for a Free Information Infrastructure (FFII). The Polish government said that if the draft directive was included on the agenda, it would request its withdrawal and postponement until it had finished its analyses, according to the FFII's translation.

This is the second time that Poland has intervened over the patent directive. The directive was initially due to be adopted on 21 December, but was removed from the agenda after the Polish undersecretary of science and information said that more time was needed to make a constructive declaration.