[LINK] Hague, Jurisdiction (was:Defamation *Everywhere* via the Net?)

[Lars Gaarden]

From: "Nick Smith" <NSMITH@nla.gov.au>

> ++ It probably won't be necessary in future for a body from Country A to
> have assets in Country B in order to be vulnerable to a Country B judgement.
> As Linkers may know, work is progressing on the Hague Convention on Foreign
> Civil Proceedings, a treaty which will allow for the recognition of foreighn
> judgements.

And the few who don't know yet can find a wealth of information on CPT:
http://www.cptech.org/ecom/jurisdiction/hague.html

To quote James Love's June 20 2001 summary of the current state of the treaty:
"What exactly does this new treaty seek to do? In a nutshell, it will strangle
the Internet with a suffocating blanket of overlapping jurisdictional claims,
expose every web page publisher to liabilities for libel, defamation and other
speech offenses from virtually any country, effectively strip Internet Service
Providers of protections from litigation over the content they carry, give
business who sell or distribute goods and services the right to dictate via
contracts the countries where disputes will be resolved and rights defended,
and narrow the grounds under which countries can protect individual consumer
rights. It provides a mechanism to greatly undermine national policies on the
"first sale" doctrine, potentially ending royalty free video rentals for
corporate entities with overseas assets, and it opens the door for cross border
enforcement of a wide range of intellectual property claims, including new and
novel rights that do not have broad international acceptance. It will lead to a
great reduction in freedom, shrink the public domain, and diminish national
sovereignty. And practically no one knows anything about the treaty."

-- 
LarsG