Making Rules in the WTO : Lessons from Article 6 of the Trips Agreement

This article analyzes making rules in the WTO in special reference to Article 6 of the TRIPS Agreement. The Uruguay Round negotiations were mainly occupied with two competing concepts on parallel imports: prohibiting or permitting parallel imports. The Contracting Parties were extremely adamant not to yield; therefore the negotiators designed Article 6 of the TRIPS Agreement as an open texture so that both of these competing concepts could be legitimized. Consequently, the nature of Article 6 of the TRIPS Agreement has become extremely complex leading to disharmonious legal regimes and practices at the domestic level. Moreover, it has resulted in a disguised form of protection of the embedded producer interests at the cost of consumer interests. Against this background, this article argues for the need to seek the true nature of Article 6 of the TRIPS Agreement embodying international exhaustion rules in light of the Paris and Berne Conventions