On 12 September 2008 the Director General of Venezuela's Trade Mark Office announced officially that Andean Community Decision 486 on a Common Industrial Property Regime was no longer applicable in Venezuela and that the only applicable IP legislation is the Industrial Property Law of 1955. Decision 486, approved by Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Venezuela on 15 September 2000, regulates all aspects of intellectual property, unfair competition, enforcement procedures and control measures. Although Venezuela left the Andean Community in 2006, this announcement was itself unexpected.
IP rights granted under the Andean legislation continue to be valid in compliance with the Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property and the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, to which Venezuala is a party. Many issues that are now missing from national IP legislation will be regulated through these international agreements.
[source: Daniela Rojas (Estudio Antequera Parilli & Rodríguez, Caracas), writing for World Trademark Report].
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