US-China tensions colour race to head global patent agency

Washington is warning about the prospect of a Chinese national heading up the UN patent agency, saying that putting Beijing in charge of global intellectual property protection would be a "terrible mistake".

"We want a candidate who comes from a country with a history of protecting IP (intellectual property)," US Ambassador Andrew Bremberg told AFP in a recent interview.

"China does not have that history," he said, voicing alarm at the idea of allowing the influential World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) to be headed by a country where IP theft and counterfeiting are rife.

China meanwhile has accused Washington of turning next week's election to replace Australian Francis Gurry after 12 years at the WIPO helm "into a political game".

Chinese Ambassador Chen Xu told reporters on Wednesday that his country's candidate Wang Binying, who has served as WIPO's deputy chief for a decade, was clearly "the strongest candidate".

But, he said, "we have got the impression that the Americans are trying to do whatever they can and ... they exert pressures (to vote for) anyone but China."
In an opinion piece published in the Financial Times on Sunday, Peter Navarro who heads a White House office on trade and manufacturing, wrote that "giving control of WIPO to a representative of China would be a terrible mistake."
Bremberg acknowledged he was "working very closely with other WIPO member states...to ensure that a top-notch, very well-qualified candidate is the one who is elected."
In the US he said, "IP-intensive industries account for nearly one-third of all employment and approximately 40 per cent of US GDP. That's an estimated USD 6.6 trillion."