"SUEPO organises on Wednesday 29 June 2016 a demonstration in Munich," it said this morning, "in front of the EPO Isar building starting at 12.30h." The staff union of the EPO fights a good fight in the name of staff and in the face of an oppressive regime like I have never before -- in my entire life -- encountered, not even outside Europe (not in Turkey and not even in notoriously repressive countries like Singapore). There is, in my humble opinion, a moral obligation for European citizens to support SUEPO, which fights not only for EPO staff but for labour rights in general (in Europe and in the West, by extension).

"The EPO's information war is a war on truth itself and even a war on justice, which EPO management downplays in spite of the fact that justice is the very cornerstone of this whole system -- a system which strive to or at least claims to do patents justice."The plethora of abuses by EPO management have been covered here in nearly a thousand articles/posts. The information we share here, however, is being 'drowned out' by an EPO PR campaign. EPO management, having paid MILLIONS of Euros for newspapers to write puff pieces, is now fighting an information war. It long ago blocked Techrights, simply for daring to inform people about what goes on, including the criminal charges against the EPO's Vice-President from Croatia (speaking of Croatia, see what EPO management wrote yesterday). The EPO's information war is a war on truth itself and even a war on justice, which EPO management downplays in spite of the fact that justice is the very cornerstone of this whole system -- a system which strive to or at least claims to do patents justice. This crucial point was mentioned yesterday by the EPO-FLIER Team. If the EPO cannot serve justice to its very own employees, what hope is there for the rest?

Looking at some recent comments on the lack of justice (at least those comments which IP Kat is not deleting^*), one person notes regarding the injustice against a real judge (not 'judge' Battistelli): "Shall we expect the EBA [Enlarged Board of Appeal] to issue a decision based on what happened and/or minutes of the hearings? Maybe in time for the next meeting of the AC? Obviously, don't expect the Office [management, i.e. Team Battistelli] to publish them..."

"Since the hearing was public," one person noted, "it would seem logical that the decision (and reasoning) would be public. Of course, in camera discussions would be excluded but it would be likely that some people would/could be concerned in advance about the scope of disclosed information relating to third parties? Perhaps sufficiently concerned as to 'advise' the EBoA about what they should disclose and not? I'm intrigued."

Alluding to the deeply defamatory allegations against the judge, one person added: "What one would definitely expect from the EBoA is that it considers whether the accused judge really is the dangerous, armed Nazi propagandist depicted by BB [Battistelli] in several public interventions and newspapers to justify the immediate house ban imposed upon him since December 2014. If not, they should absolutely exonerate him publicly from such charges."

“What one would definitely expect from the EBoA is that it considers whether the accused judge really is the dangerous, armed Nazi propagandist depicted by BB [Battistelli] in several public interventions and newspapers to justify the immediate house ban imposed upon him since December 2014.”
      --AnonymousWith judges being treated as criminals by ENA graduate Battistelli, it's understandable that they worry about their independence. In our next post we'll explain why their fears are very much justified. "To what extent," asked one person, "is the EBoA (or any board) able to function as a court? I'm not clear what their ability is to hear witnesses and what the consequence of perjury is. Can they refer such cases (and I'm not suggesting that is relevant here) to local authorities? Would they be able to require witnesses to make affidavits before local authorities? I ask this only with regard to the EBoA's ability to make statements of innocence or guilt. I thought their brief was limited to answering the request placed before them according to EPO laws."

A previous EPO protest/strike was titled "lawfulness at the EPO" and since Battistelli has done virtually nothing to restore even the perception of lawfulness (he has only escalated his union-busting since) we know that hopes of an EPO that respects the rule of law -- be it patent law or human rights laws -- is farcical at best. Degradation of patent examination protocols will be discussed in our next post. ⬆ _____ ^* Some readers have contacted us since we published an article regarding IP Kat. They say that they too have had polite comments of theirs deleted.