Summary: New trouble for Željko Topić in Strasbourg, making it yet another EPO Vice-President who is on shaky grounds and paving the way to managerial collapse/avalanche at the EPO

PRESIDENTIAL loyalists like Willy Minnoye (Vice-President of the European Patent Office), Ciaran McGinley and Lucy Neville-Rolfe are leaving and the Croatian gravy train (the 'Balkan Express') is close to crashing. We have received the following information from Croatia today. It looks plausible that one EPO Vice-President won’t just retire early but might actually end up behind bars like Ivo Josipović (former President of the Republic of Croatia). In the words of our source:

STRASBOURG – TWO CORRUPTION INDICTMENTS BROUGHT AGAINST ŽELJKO TOPIĆ

On 19 December 2016 the EU Court in Strasbourg received two indictments against Željko Topić, former Director General of the State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO) of the Republic of Croatia in Zagreb and currently the right hand of Benoit Battistelli at the European Patent Office (EPO) in Munich. The indictments include a number of offences in support of corruption committed by Željko Topić as an accountable person during his DG office at the SIPO in Croatia. Namely, due to inefficiency of the Croatian justice and the political protection provided to Željko Topić in the Republic of Croatia, especially by the State Attorney’s Office of the Republic of Croatia (DORH in Croatian) and the Office for the Suppression of Corruption and Organised Crime (USKOK in Croatian), after more than 8 years of investigation, a party to the proceedings made a decision to seek legal protection within the international frameworks at the EU Court in Strasbourg. At any rate, Croatia has not been declared one of the most corrupt countries in the world for no reason according to the latest Corruption Perceptions Index of Transparency International. The most tragic fact in the entire lengthy investigative proceedings in Croatia is that Željko Topić has never been called in for questioning by the police or the State Attorney’s Office. All this time Željko Topić has been receiving his pay from the EPO nonstop in the amount of EUR 18,000.- a month, and the parking space in the EPO car park in Munich has been adorned by his black Mercedes-Benz illegally appropriated from the SIPO in Zagreb, i.e. from the Republic of Croatia. The former President of the Republic of Croatia, Ivo Josipović, is listed as one of the potential political protectors of Mr. Topić. Using a possible criminal offence of influence peddling the former Croatian President has protected Željko Topić from criminal prosecution in investigative structures of the Republic of Croatia for a number of years for one reason only, which reason concerns the operation of the Croatian parafiscal musical association under the name of the Music Authors Rights Protection Office (ZAMP in Croatian). That is to say, by obstructing investigation and protecting Željko Topić the former Croatian President Ivo Josipović in fact has been protecting himself since there is a clear trail of corruption offences leading directly to him over the ZAMP and the SIPO. Moreover, the staffing of the SIPO of the Republic of Croatia is largely comprised of the ZAMP employees having disputable qualifications. The fear that Željko Topić might “squeal on him” during the investigation and the legal proceedings in fashion of the member of the Calabrian mafia has resulted in dropping of criminal charges against him, which in this particular case ended up in Strasbourg. The final act in this judicial play protecting the person and the action of corrupt Željko Topić was performed at the County Court in Zagreb and the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Croatia where the investigations against Topić were declared inadmissible. Therefore, and especially due to the unbearable stench of the judicial marshland, nobody in Croatia was surprised by the most recent statement given to the media by the new Minister of Interior saying that all judges of the Constitutional Court should hand in their resignations on account of corruption since they pose a direct threat to national security of the Republic of Croatia. In addition to the legal proceedings in Strasbourg, the party to the proceedings has also announced criminal prosecution against the leading persons in Croatian justice, and the DORH and the USKOK implicated in protection of Željko Topić. Those charges will also be brought in France, most probably at the Ministry of Justice in Albertville or Grenoble. Specifically, after Croatia joined the EU as a full Member State, the Croatian citizens also have a possibility to take criminal offences to courts beyond the Croatian borders. In conclusion, as learned off the record, there are at least 6 more criminal investigations carried out against Željko Topić in Croatia.

Yes, we already heard about those additional 6 criminal investigations against Željko Topić in Croatia. The man seems to be corrupt enough to match the job requirements of Battistelli and Bergot. And since he is so legally vulnerable they can probably better control him (e.g. by blackmail), too.

We shall post more information about the Strasbourg case in the coming days if not weeks.

The situation at the EPO is getting worse by the day. Published a few days ago by media in Luxembourg (looks like a French and German mix) was an article about the climate at the EPO. The purely automated translation (not edited) says:

The dispute between the President and the Suepo trade union, which represents the bulk of the 7,000-strong workforce, has been raging for more than five years. Minister Etienne Schneider is now responding to a parliamentary question by the LSAP deputies, Claudia Dall’Agnol.

The leadership style of President Benoît Battistelli, who took over this office in 2010, leads from escalation to escalation. Only recently did employees move through the streets of Munich and consulates. According to the statements of the trade unionists, Battistelli has for a long time sprawled the bow so far that the working climate is at its zero point. In the course of this year, three trade unionists from the Suepo were already set before the door. According to our information, the President has indicated very spurious causes of these cancellations, which are not to be attributed to the hair.

Full and accurate translation of the entire article will be appreciated. █

Whistleblower ist weder Datendieb noch Erpresser

Summary: Whistleblowers at the EPO cannot speak and surveillance reaches extraordinary levels, the excuse being security, stability, justice and so on (surveillance classics)

EARLIER this year we wrote about rumours of fraud at the EPO and not too long ago we became witnesses to the pretext of “fraud” as as exploited to spy on staff and grossly violate their privacy or data security (in a way that no member state would tolerate). The members of the GCC who are members of the CSC wrote the following text: “We obviously do not support fraud and so consider it perfectly legitimate that some controls (checks and balances) are introduced in order to detect and/or prevent fraud also in the field of the healthcare insurance. However, this raises an additional big concern linked to the new contract and its external administrator: fraud control measures and the possible involvement of the EPO’s Investigation Unit. We are completely kept in the dark as to how the EPO intends to put in practice these controls. What will be the role of Cigna who are obviously best positioned (access to the data) to detect fraud)? Are they bound to respect national laws? What will be the role of the Investigative Unit? How will the different parties cooperate? How will medical secrecy be preserved? Which laws will apply at which steps? Why does the Office not collaborate with (local) national prosecutors since this would be compatible with Article 20, EPC? Not only have none of these questions been answered, we have not heard about any safeguards. We fear that this is an area that may raise serious problems in the future with possible damage to the EPO’s reputation. Although we have not been required to give an opinion despite the blatant impact that this new contract will have on staff employment conditions, we nevertheless recommend that the President should not implement the planned modifications as long as a joint Committee has not been established.”

“The way things work at the moment is a recipe for disaster because the Office already fails to attract top talent — the very kind of talent which it takes to deliver a good service and justify the high fees associated with EPs (grant, renewal, search etc.).”We often wonder how many violations it would take for Eponia to finally come under proper scrutiny from member states (beyond a slap on the wrist, at the very least a fine). The way things work at the moment is a recipe for disaster because the Office already fails to attract top talent — the very kind of talent which it takes to deliver a good service and justify the high fees associated with EPs (grant, renewal, search etc.). To make matters worse, a lot of key staff has been leaving and continues to leave the Office (the growing numbers of departures that we see are irrefutable). A new comment in IP Kat asked: “What would the European Patent system look like in, say, 2 to 4 years?” Here is the full comment:

“Anonymous” from Saturday, 12 November 2016 is trying to change the subject, isn’t he/she? The facts are quite simple: Battistelli got instructions from the Council not to fire staff members before new regulations are passed and did just the opposite.

That is the real problem here.

Battistelli is not doing what the Council wants. I asked what the Council can do and apparently the Council cannot do much because of the 3/4 of the votes clause. I said Battistelli just needs 10 countries to stay forever and follow his plans and nobody raised a credible objection. I don’t see how a ministerial conference could solve that problem.

So let us imagine that Battistelli stays another few years to continue his plans. The Council cannot do much because of this blocking minority. What would the effect be? What would the European Patent system look like in, say, 2 to 4 years?

It will be morally — maybe also fiscally — bankrupt (it’s said to be operating at a loss), more so assuming Battistelli continues along the same trajectory which renders examiners redundant in just two years. Will it be folded onto EUIPO? Serious intervention is needed to ensure that the EPO doesn’t just become a relic or a fossil from the past. The way things stand, based on what we are hearing from insiders, there is no promising future for the EPO (if any future at all). █

Summary: The USPTO is found to have been burning taxpayers’ money and the patent microcosm, which profits from this entire sort of ‘racket’, is trying to defend or belittle these findings

THE USPTO has been dealt a serious blow which we mentioned here very briefly the other day (billing fraud, similar to what's alleged to be happening at the EPO).

It is no surprise that examiner misconduct and fraud is defended by IAM ‘magazine’, but having followed their sources we are left worried. Here is what IAM wrote to excuse/dismiss it all (the headline is “accusations against USPTO staff may have less meat than reported”):

But according to Matt Levy, patent counsel with the Computer Communications Industry Association (CCIA), the numbers from the OIG’s report should be put in context. Earlier this week, in a letter to the editor of the Washington Post, Levy claimed that the report exaggerated the scope of the problem. When broken down, he calculates that the waste amounts to an average of six minutes per examiner at the USPTO (he went into further detail in an IP Watchdog post here).

I reached out to Levy for a little more detail on his reasons for writing the letter. Here’s his response: “It seemed pretty clear that the OIG was making the problem look far worse than it was. I’ve written about the GAO’s report on quality, and I’ve been hopeful that it would garner some attention. Unfortunately, the scandal that the IG’s report created seemed likely to suck up all the oxygen. My goal was to bring a little perspective and, hopefully, help focus the conversation back on patent quality.”

Most patent owners would probably agree with Levy. That isn’t to denigrate the latest findings of the OIG but the more fundamental problem for the US patent system is the quality of the grants that it makes. That was certainly one of the main findings of IAM’s most recent benchmarking survey which was elaborated on by a more recent piece of research by Colleen Chien of Santa Clara University

Putting aside that last paragraph which is IAM's self-promotion (of propaganda), watch who they’re using to support their position. Remember which companies are behind CCIA, never mind Watchtroll (IP Watchdog) and other USPTO friends/buddies. It’s like a sort of coverup attempt because a lot of the above piggybacks Matt Levy from CCIA. It is a man whose wife works for the USPTO, i.e. his household receives a salary from the USPTO — something that should probably be mentioned (he personally asked me not to mention this again, but it’s hard given these circumstances and given that Levy gave away this potential conflict of interest himself, in his own blog). Watch what he wrote in response to the original piece (filed under “opinions”). His wife works for the USPTO, yet he does not disclose this in his letter to the editor (regarding the USPTO). How is one supposed to simply ignore this? The echo chamber in defense of fraud isn’t something that’s a minor detail that can be trivially overlooked. Found via this tweet are some vicious attacks on Florian Müller for bringing up the issue. A former IP Kat writer is slamming him for stating the obvious and he responds with: “Doesn’t matter due to fee diversion. Ultimately it is taxpayers’ money anyway.” Patent law firms too are against taxpayers now [1, 2, 3, 4]? Or implicitly in defense of billing fraud? How would that make them look? It is hard to explain to the patent microcosm its unwanted role (as it relates to practicing developers) [1, 2], but Müller did try and at the end he wrote a summary of his position as follows [1, 2, 3, 4]: “Some patent folks are being too emotional about USPTO fee diversion to think things through correctly. Let’s enlighten them now: Question was: if employees steal from USPTO, are taxpayers the ultimate victims? Yes. There are 2 independent ways to prove this. First, every $ less that the USPTO can send to Treasury (fee diversion) is a $ more that taxpayers have to contribute to pay for something. Second, fee diversion goes both ways: if theft contributed to a USPTO deficit, taxpayers would have to close the gap.”

“Slamming the watchdog isn’t easy (shooting the messenger which is independent) and if nefarious tactics are used to belittle the problem itself, what does that tell us about the accused (collectively) or their spouses?”I have exchanged quite a few E-mails about this subject since (Müller expressed some views) and it’s saddening to hear that patent law firms implicitly threaten alienation in retaliation for stating of the obvious. By doing so they probably risk only isolating themselves even further, turning software developers like myself and Müller into a foe.

For those who want to hear opinions from sites not run by software developers, consider reading “Patent office employees steal millions from American taxpayers”. To quote: “A new report from an independent watchdog found that employees of the Patent and Trademark office billed the government (AKA, the taxpayers) for 300,000 hours they never worked, costing the American people $18.2 million.

“Many employees work from home, and the report found numerous instances of time logged without any work being completed.

“The amount of wasted man-hours that could have been spent reducing the patent backlog is astounding, not to mention the millions of taxpayer dollars that were wasted paying employees for work they were not doing,” House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) told the Washington Post.”

Working from home for the USPTO is something which Levy’s wife has been doing. It’s a shame that he did not disclose that in his letter of response to this piece from August 31^st (“Patent office workers bilked the government of millions by playing hooky, watchdog finds”).

Slamming the watchdog isn’t easy (shooting the messenger which is independent) and if nefarious tactics are used to belittle the problem itself, what does that tell us about the accused (collectively) or their spouses? █

Whistleblower ist weder Datendieb noch Erpresser

Summary: EPO scandals are not publicly accessible or known to many people and not many such scandals are known at all because people are afraid of Battistelli’s Fabius Maximus strategies

THINGS at the EPO may seem to have calmed down (there are court proceedings for representatives to focus on, having prepared for a while), but there are many stories that still ought to be told. Some cannot be told. Some cannot be told just yet. Some just need further corroborating evidence. Publishing these in the form of rumours and presenting them as such is clearly permissible.

“Publishing these in the form of rumours and presenting them as such is clearly permissible.”Some time ago we learned from a reliable source (with track record of accuracy) about fraud at the EPO. We are talking about financial fraud here (like payment orders), but people are afraid to speak about it directly to the public, to the authorities, or to journalists. Having witnessed how Battistelli and his circle treat even the gentlest of critics, who can blame them? Battistelli engages in managerial terrorism. He created an atmosphere of so much fear that even people who have truly credible arguments and evidence to back it up with dare not speak to anyone about it.

In the case of fraud, there is a criminal nature to it and one’s ability (or courage) to step forward would typically depend the severity of the fraud and certainty of prosecution (vindicating the messenger). Under Battistelli’s terrifying regime it takes a lot of courage to speak out about such things. Maybe it’s just a matter of time. Typically, whistleblowers are protected by the law itself, but in Eponia lawlessness prevails (Battistelli and his minion even brag about it!). These whistleblowers should not really need any protection from the employer but from anticorruption entities (the EPO's press spokesperson came from one, effectively defecting); but what anticorruption entities are there inside Eponia? None. It’s just absurd. The EPO conveniently ignores national laws but at the same time it enforces employment embargo/sanctions on EPO staff after their departure from Eponia. It also legally threatens people outside Eponia, myself included.

We are pretty certain that there is fraud going on, but at this stage we have to classify this “rumour” (however strong) and revisit the claim if or when this becomes public knowledge. █

Reference: Wikipedia

Summary: “Theranos may have put as many as 890,000 lives per year in jeopardy with its fake technology,” to quote one source, but the EPO’s Inventor of the Year propped up this dangerous scam or, in the words of another, this is “how you get to be worth $9 billion on a “technology” that was nothing but fraud.”

THERE is not much sense of employment pride among examiners (i.e. scientists) working for Battistelli. The EPO is so full of abuses at so many levels (usually behind a cloak of secrecy as there’s no true transparency) that it has become an abundant gold mine for disappointing if not outrageous news where people are routinely incentivised to cheat and defraud, including last year's 'Inventor of the Year' award finalist Elizabeth Holmes.

Elizabeth Holmes, as we noted here before, turns out to have allegedly run a dangerous scam and for the EPO to affiliate with her proved to be an expensive political exercise (costing several millions of euros and corrupting the media in the process, just as Holmes had done).

Below are some quotes summarising the story and recent events concerning last year’s ‘Inventor of the Year’ star Elizabeth Holmes. These have been circulating among EPO staff (the first article is from Wednesday), so they help demonstrate just how negatively EPO staff views this ‘Inventor of the Year’ charade:

From $4.5 billion to $0: Forbes revalues Elizabeth Holmes’ worth

“Theranos founder: From billionaire to ‘nothing’“
[ http://money.cnn.com/2016/06/01/technology/elizabeth-holmes-theranos-forbes/index.html ]

From Billion Dollar Baby [ http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2783675/Meet-college-dropout-self-billionaire-fear-needles-inspired-invent-new-way-test-blood.html ]

To nothing [ http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-05-18/elizabeth-holmes-admits-theranos-technolgy-fraud-restates-voids-years-test-results ]

“Elizabeth Holmes Admits Theranos’ “Technology” Is A Fraud: Restates, Voids Years Of Test Results”

“In the process of commiting fraud and building up her valuation, Holmes repeatedly gambled with people’s lives, sending them clearly wrong results. As a result some patients have received erroneous results that might have thrown off health decisions made with their doctors, the WSJ reports. All this is needed is one death and there is a criminal case.”

---

BACKGROUND

http://fortune.com/2014/06/12/theranos-blood-holmes/

This story is from the June 30, 2014 issue of Fortune:

“Elizabeth Holmes founded her revolutionary blood diagnostics company, Theranos, when she was 19. It’s now worth more than $9 billion, and poised to change health care.”

“In the fall of 2003, Elizabeth Holmes, a 19-year-old sophomore at Stanford, plopped herself down in the office of her chemical engineering professor, Channing Robertson, and said, “Let’s start a company.”“

““When I finally connected with what Elizabeth fundamentally is,” he [Channing Robertson] says, “I realized that I could have just as well been looking into the eyes of a Steve Jobs or a Bill Gates.””

“The company has performed as many as 70 different tests from a single draw of 25 to 50 microliters collected in a tiny vial the size of an electric fuse, which Holmes has dubbed a “nanotainer.” Such a volley of tests with conventional techniques would require numerous tubes of blood, each containing 3,000- to 5,000-microliter samples.”

“Precisely how Theranos accomplishes all these amazing feats is a trade secret. Holmes will only say–and this is more than she has ever said before–that her company uses “the same fundamental chemical methods” as existing labs do. Its advances relate to “optimizing the chemistry” and “leveraging software” to permit those conventional methods to work with tiny sample volumes.”

““The first time I heard about this, I thought it was snake oil and mirrors [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snake_oil],” says David Helfet, the chief of orthopedic trauma at the Hospital for Special Surgery in Manhattan. But after reviewing voluminous validation studies supplied to him by the company, he has become a believer and is urging his hospital to consider adoption.”

““It takes at least 10 times–and maybe 100 times–less space for doing the same thing,” says Laret of UCSF Medical Center.”

“What do incumbent players in the blood-diagnostic space think about all of this? The most frequent criticism is that Theranos is using purportedly breakthrough technology to perform tests that are relied on for life-and-death decisions without having first published any validation studies in peer-review journals. “I don’t know what they’re measuring, how they’re measuring it, and why they think they’re measuring it,” says Richard Bender, an oncologist who is also a medical affairs consultant for Quest Diagnostics, the largest independent diagnostic lab.

Holmes counters that because, as noted, her tests employ “the same fundamental chemical methods” as existing tests, peer-review publication of validation studies is both unnecessary and inappropriate.”

“Theranos, which does not buy any analyzers from third parties, is therefore in a unique position. While it would need FDA approval to sell its own analyzers to other labs, it doesn’t do that. It uses its analyzers only in its own CMS-certified lab. All its tests are therefore LDTs, effectively exempt from FDA oversight.”

“Beyond the validation disputes, skeptics also question Theranos’s business model.”

“Critics are likewise puzzled by the cosmic vastness of Holmes’s end-to-end business model. If Theranos is making breakthrough analyzers, they wonder, why doesn’t it just sell them to existing labs?”

“Early investors included venture capitalists Draper Fisher Jurvetson (which has funded Tesla and SpaceX), ATA Ventures, Silicon Valley legend Don Lucas Sr. (Oracle, National Semiconductor, Macromedia), and Oracle’s Larry Ellison.”

“Today Holmes is a co-inventor on 82 U.S. and 189 foreign patent applications, of which 18 in the U.S. and 66 abroad have been granted.”

Patents on a scam granted.

Long story short, Holmes begrudgingly admits she ran a fraudulent operation and a lot of people died because of her, whereas Battistelli and his goons groomed her. Nice publicity stunt right there, owing to the unscientific and extravagant leadership of Team Battistelli (Battistelli and his buddies/confidants who lack scientific education/background/experience). Maybe Holmes and Željko Topić will have a topic for discussion if both end up behind bars (there are ongoing criminal cases). █

So proud of Theranos…

Oh. Ouch!

Summary: Battistelli’s introduction of a weirdly-covered (by French media partners) ceremony is revisited in light of a truly embarrassing revelation with criminal elements to it

Battistelli is doing a lot of what FIFA’s Blatter was doing in order to distract the media and create a positive image of the organisation. The EPO is supposed to be neutral about patents/applications it deals with, but neutrality was thrown out the window under Battistelli's regime (large corporations receive special treatment).

There is also this thing called “Inventor Award”, which the EPO keeps promoting in Twitter every week or so (sometimes several times per week), neglecting to say anything about corruptible media organisations that play along.

“Here is a new ego trip by President Battistelli,” told us a source this week, taking note of this news about a “scandal”. To quote:

The wheels are coming off the cart at Theranos, the $9 billion startup founded by Stanford dropout Elizabeth Holmes when she was 19. Its proprietary blood testing technology is the subject of a scathing report from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), but that’s just the latest in a growing list of woes for the troubled unicorn.

First, the FDA declared the company’s nanotube container for collecting blood from a finger prick to be an unapproved medical device. Then, CMS found serious deficiencies that forced a shutdown of Theranos’ Northern California lab. And while the company’s deal with Safeway never got off the ground, Walgreens is reportedly looking for a way to get out of its agreement.

But the one thing that the secretive Silicon Valley startup has managed to avoid is peer-reviewed, independent testing that compares the results of its proprietary diagnostic testing to that of other labs like Quest Diagnostics and LabCorp. Last week, that changed, and the results were devastating.

What does this have to do with the EPO? Theranos was somewhat of a VIP at the EPO, owing to the whole “Inventor Award” publicity stunt of Battistelli.

“The European Inventor of the year is a huge waste of applicants’ money (over 1 million EUR/exercise),” told us our source, “besides the ethical questions related to the mission of the EPO.”

“Unlike former presidents, Battistelli is no scientist but a well-connected politician from École nationale d’administration.”“It is a mere ego exercise for the sole satisfaction of the pathetic president with some real risks. And now here we are.” (warning: epo.org link)

So, in short, it seems to link Battistelli’s inane “Inventor Award” to potentially fraudulent pseudo-science. Not that Battistelli himself would be able to discern/distinguish between science and pseudo-science. Unlike former presidents, Battistelli is no scientist but a well-connected politician from École nationale d’administration. █

Children were made prisoners of Microsoft
and those responsible for it are sent to prison

Summary: An update from Romania regarding a corrupt contract for Microsoft software

THE SITUATION with regards to corruption in Romania is grimmer than in most of Europe and Microsoft’s role in it was covered here before, e.g. in:

• Microsoft and Romania: Follow the Money
• Microsoft ‘Vampires’ Suck Blood of Romania’s OOXML Voters, Supporters
• Ballot Stuffer from Redmond Stuffs Another FOSS Conference (Romania)
• Head of Microsoft Romania Quits, Entryism Revisited
• Romania Under Pressure to Allow Free/Libre Software
• The UK Shares Romania’s Pain as Free Software Excluded From Public Services
• Romanian Government: Programs Are Better With Source Code
• Dan Bulucea, Business and Marketing Director of Microsoft Romania, Escapes and Enters Google
• Microsoft Reinforces Its Criminal Organisation Status by Bribing and Corrupting More Officials, Even in Europe
• Commentary: In Romania, the Government Serves Just Windows Users

Last month we took note of Microsoft licences in the midst of high-profile corruption and a former Romanian minister is finally going to prison over it. To quote one article about this (in English, not Romanian): “Romania’s high court of cassation and justice on Thursday jailed the former telecommunications minister, Gabriel Sandu, for two years for money laundering, abuse of office and bribery involving the lease of Microsoft IT licenses for schools.

“The ex-mayor of the eastern town of Piatra Neamt, Gheorghe Stefan, and two other businessmen who acted as middlemen also got jail terms of up to three years.

“The four defendants have also to pay a total of almost 10 million euros in compensation. The Supreme Court’s sentence is not final.”

It is worth noting that owing to such corruption it is Microsoft — not GNU/Linux and Free software — that makes it into Romanian schools. Recent reports serve to indicate Microsoft corruption in other countries; this is still the subject of a US-led probe which maybe some more corruption can somehow scuttle. Recall Microsoft’s influence in the United States government, its tax evasion (which only recently became an issue) and big payments to the current US President. “Prosecutors said there was manifest corruption in the contract worth 105 million US dollars,” says the above article, “which was to supply Microsoft Office licenses to schools and other public institutions between 2004 and 2009.”

The article pretends that Microsoft has nothing to do with this corruption/bribery, even though Microsoft clearly benefited from it. How convenient. █

Having spent some time separating facts from rumours (there are plenty which we still investigate) about the EPO, we are now ready to proceed to something new, or rather a new kind of scandal that nobody seems to have paid attention to.

Based on what we are hearing (and that’s not just a rumour), there is immense pressure on managers at the EPO to pretend that they support the President, even if deep inside they don’t. As one anonymous comment put it yesterday: “Certainly the letter will be signed by the various Minnoye, Topić, Casado, Lutz, Bergot, Hannard, McGinley, Requena et al. and by a bunch of fearful PDs and directors. But the letter will not help them. On the contrary, it will prove that the staff was right in their protest. If Kongstad’s letter is not a joke, the crisis is unavoidable and BB must either give in or go. Of course, with cooperation money and with secret deals BB convince some delegations to vote against the draft letter and create new obstacles. But the conflict will remain unsolved and explode again after few weeks. A good advice to BB: Monsieur, pack your luggages and go back to Saint-Germain-en-Laye.”

This mirrors something that we saw before with Željko Topić (letters of intent and perhaps forced ‘apologies’ under threats). One reader told us: “I am hearing interesting rumblings about the senior management “petition” to the AC. Some PDs are giving the Directors a “free vote” as to whether they sign or not, others are telling them that if they don’t sign it there will be grave consequences.”

Yet another comment said: “It should also be investigated whether Mr Kongstad received monthly payments from a secret budget of department 4.3 if proven, it would be scandalous! Mr Del Pozo, PD Finances, should finally come out with the truth about all that he had to sign. Soon or later all the dirty tricks and manoeuvres will be uncovered!”

This is not yet known to us, so it should be classified as a rumour. There is definitely some kind of an H.R. crisis at the EPO right now. There’s no denying that [1, 2]. Tomorrow we are going to show a leaked message from Topić, relating to H.R. Today, however, we wish to share something different, also relating to Topić.

As vigilant readers may have already noticed (it’s everywhere in the news right now), WIPO is in big trouble. As EPO-funded media put it: “The long saga that has unfolded since then WIPO deputy director general James Pooley made a number of serious allegations against the organisation’s director-general Francis Gurry in a report of misconduct filed in April 2014 may be drawing to an end. News stories from several sources – including the Fox News website and The Register – state that a report into the claims undertaken by the UN’s Office of Internal Oversight Services (OIOS) has been submitted to Gabriel Duque, the chair of WIPO’s General Assemblies.”

Here is how WIPR put it

A joint subcommittee at the US Congress will hold a hearing this week on whistle-blowers and accountability at the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO).

The hearing, scheduled for tomorrow, February 24, is expected to reference the results of a pending UN investigation into WIPO and hear from ex-employees at the organisation.

James Pooley, a former WIPO deputy director, Moncef Kateb, ex-president of the staff association, and Miranda Brown, an adviser to WIPO’s director general Francis Gurry, will be witnesses.

So what does it have to do with EPO? Glad you asked. Apart from the fact that Battistelli may be the next Gurry, there is something interesting about Topić. A reader sent us the details. Another newly-translated Croatian article from 2012 helps support this reader’s claims.

“Referring to the recent Techrights posting,” wrote this reader, the “Dnevno article from 5 February 2016 includes a mention of the role of the former Ambassador to the UN in Geneva, Ms. Vesna Vuković, as part of the “diplomatic network” of the former Croatian President Ivo Josipović who failed to secure re-election in 2015.

“The English translation of another older article from 2012 which describes the role of Ms. Vuković in more detail. In view of the recent speculation about a link between Battistelli and the “Bygmalion affair” in France, it would be interesting to know whether any EPO funds got diverted to Croatia to support Josipovic’s re-election campaign in Croatia during 2014/2015.”

Here is the Dnevno article in English with our emphasis in yellow:

A DIPLOMATIC CHAMELEON

Vesna Vuković hosts Mr. Topić in Geneva despite having systematically reported him to the State Attorney’s Office and the USKOK^*

[^*The Croatian State Prosecutor’s Office for the Suppression of Organized Crime and Corruption]

Author: Darko Petričić

Wednesday, 4th April 2012 – 11:19

The new government is persistent in its strange attempts to bolster Mr. Željko Topić, against whom a dozen serious criminal charges have been filed. These charges not only appear to tally with each other but are dispersed over a broad timeline and encompass many diverse sections and articles of the Criminal Code. Neither the State Attorney’s Office (DORH) nor the Croatian State Prosecutor’s Office for the Suppression of Organized Crime and Corruption (USKOK), have taken any action so far for reasons known to only to themselves.

During the last month, we witnessed the attempts of the new government to make bizarre appointments starting with the cases of Mr. Ferenčak at JANAF and Mr. Kovačević at HEP and culminating in the notorious case of Željko Topić at the State Intellectual Property Office (DZIV).

The DZIV – identified but not yet fully explored as an international epicenter of corruption in Croatia

There would be nothing strange about all this, if it wasn’t for the small but interesting detail that a dozen serious criminal charges have been filed against Željko Topić which not only appear to tally with each other but are dispersed over a broad timeline and encompass many diverse sections and articles of the Criminal Code. For reasons known only to themselves neither the State Attorney’s Office nor the Croatian State Prosecutor’s Office for the Suppression of Organized Crime and Corruption (USKOK) have taken any action so far, although many insiders who are familiar with the affairs of the DZIV and its operations as well as with the activities of Željko Topić believe that the USKOK urgently needs to move into that state institution with their best agents in order to carry out a thorough investigation of the allegedly serious wrongdoings.

Among the criminal charges filed against Mr. Topić, and in this case also the representative of the international company Lufthansa in Croatia, are two complaints filed by the owner of the international AirPlus trademark. It is interesting to note that the current Ambassador of the Republic of Croatia to the UN in Geneva is the co-signatory of these criminal charges against the Director of the Croatian State Intellectual Property Office, and the representative of Lufthansa in Croatia, the attorney Andrew Matijević. In addition, over the phone, she advised some legal representatives of the owner of the Airplus trademark about what needed to be done. It might have been concluded that her main concern was to have these charges relating to the most prominent unlawful activities at the Croatian State Intellectual Property Office dealt with.

Furthermore, in the summer of 2010, Mrs. Vesna Vuković personally contacted the Deputy Attorney General, Mr. Dubravko Palijaš with urgent requests to accelerate the processing of the previously reported criminal acts. So it is patently obvious that Ms. Vesna Vuković was involved in the pressing of charges against of Mr. Topić and that she was personally motivated to do so. But that’s not the end of the story. Together with the owner of the Airplus trademark, in the summer of 2010 she co- signed the letters addressed to the USKOK and the National Council for Monitoring and Combating Corruption in Croatia and provided the legal framework of the complaint which requested the dismissal of the Director of Croatia Airlines, Mr. Ivan Mišetić, based on the published news that he simultaneously occupied two positions of control – one of which was in Buzin [near Zagreb], and the other on the Lufthansa Supervisory Board in Frankfurt am Main. The story about this case was first covered by the journalist Joseph Bohutinski in the weekly magazine “Business” and was later republished in several other media.

Following that complaint, Mr. Ivan Mišetić was dismissed in the autumn of 2010 and everything else, especially his public statement concerning the termination of his employment relationship with Croatia Airlines, is a trite and fabricated story for public consumption. However, nothing has happened since then in the competent institutions of the Republic of Croatia regarding the issue of criminal liability for damage to the national airline and there is still no information as to whether the person in question paid taxes in Croatia for the unlawful supervisory position which he held for many years in the German Lufthansa or whether his income from that source has remained “invisible” to our tax administration. To this day there is still no answer to the following scandalous question with its manifold implications for issues relating to politics, corruption and privatization: Is Lufthansa the hidden owner of Croatia Airlines and, if so, who facilitated this?

Vesna Vuković – moral and professional diplomatic ‘chameleon’ of the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs (MVEP)

What is particularly striking is the highly unusual behavior of our Ambassador in Geneva and her official position in relation to the above matters. As a matter of fact, from the date of her appointment until now, she has received the above mentioned Director of the State Intellectual Property Office, Mr. Željko Topić, as her guest on at least two occasions because her job description and activities include following the activities of an international institution called the “World Intellectual Property Organization” (WIPO) whose headquarters are located in Geneva and of which the Croatian State Intellectual Property Office is a member. The evidence of this can easily be found on the official websites the of the Croatian State Intellectual Property Office and the WIPO.

She knew – or at least she must have known – who Mr. Željko Topić was immediately after his first visit to Geneva. In accordance with the structure of the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs (MVEP) as well as from the point of view of security and information exchange with Zagreb headquarters, she should have been obliged at that point to write an official note and officially send it to the competent minister, with a copy to the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs (MVEP) Sector VII in charge of information and safety.

According to the Croatian Foreign Affairs Act, the general regulations of the MVEP and the professional obligations of any ambassador, they have to function as State Attorneys. For example if, when traveling by public transportation, they accidentally overhear a conversation describing actions which threaten the security of the Republic of Croatia or learn of a criminal offence and the names of persons associated with it, immediately upon arriving at their office or embassy, they must report this in writing to the competent state bodies according to their internal organization. The proof of this can be found in the thousands of diplomatic dispatches which are currently being published by Wikileaks in a manner which illustrates the aforementioned problem by means of the publication of confidential emails between the embassies of various countries around the world and the capitals of their countries of origin and vice versa.

Why did Ambassador Vuković failed to act in the appropriate manner? Considering that a key role in her irregular and unlawful appointment to the position of the Croatian Ambassador in Geneva at the beginning of last year was played by one of the advisors to President Josipović to the detriment of other candidates and considering that, according to the information available to us, the President of the Republic of Croatia is one of the main patrons of the incriminated DZIV Director, Ms. Vuković may very well have concluded that she should be at the disposal of her new “boss” even though he is only one of the shapers of Croatian foreign policy. This supposition is supported by the fact that the legal representative of the Director of the DZIV, Mr. Željko Topić, in one of the aforementioned criminal proceedings is Silvio Hraste from the Zagreb law firm on whose premises part of election headquarters of Ivo Josipović during his Presidential campaign was located, according to some unofficial sources.

For the moment it remains unclear as to how Minister Željko Jovanović was dragged into this dirty game and why, for more than a month now, there have been no official reports of the inspection of the Croatian State Intellectual Property Office by the competent ministries which was conducted more than a month ago on 2 February 2012. It took only one day to complete the inspection of the Croatian State Intellectual Property Office which was conducted under the control of Mr. Saša Zelenika, Deputy Minister to Mr. Jovanović. We do not know whether or not the leaders of the WIPO in Geneva are familiar with this first-class corruption scandal and its epicenter in Croatia. However, according to our sources this case may soon acquire an international dimension.

Before his election as President, Ivo Josipović was a frequent guest at the Croatian State Intellectual Property Office and in the office of the Director, Mr. Topić. Since he relied on the staff of the Croatian Composers’ Society (ZAMP) to fill the most important positions in the Croatian State Intellectual Property Office, he was certainly very interested in making sure that the international component responsible for intellectual property in Geneva was “covered” by a reliable person in the ambassadorial “network” as he himself likes to call it. All of this is the obvious proof of the operation of a parallel system of government inside our country and on an international level.

One has the impression that the current relations between the Pantovčak [the President's Office] and Geneva are based on the same pattern as the already famous “Čačić’s axiom” [attributed to the former Deputy Prime Minister Radimir Čačić]: “No Government, from now on you talk only to me! – and involve bypassing the official protocol at the Zrinjevac [the Ministry of Foreign Affairs]. There’s nothing new about this. As the first President of the Republic of Croatia, Franjo Tudjman, used to say: “Tie the horse where I tell you.” This sentence usually referred to Croatian foreign policy actions and the inter-Governmental appearances of the then Foreign Minister Mate Granić who was never completely trusted by Tudjman.

EPO H.R. must have been utterly poor for quite a while if it actually hired a man with dozens of criminal cases against him, according to the above article. On numerous occasions we already covered the UN and the Lufthansa aspects, though not WIPO. Readers can find coverage on these in older articles.

Our reader has remarked on the above article as follows:

As the article about Ms. Vukovic refers to the WIPO in Geneva, the links about the shenanigans in that organisation which are appended below might also be of interest:

There should be a live webcast here for anybody interested starting at 14:00 Washington time on 24 Feb (that’s later today):

http://foreignaffairs.house.gov/hearing/joint-subcommittee-hearing-establishing-accountability-world-intellectual-property

Some reports:

Congress to quiz WIPO whistle-blowers

http://www.worldipreview.com/news/congress-to-quiz-wipo-whistle-blowers-9608

Where is the Report on the Allegations From WIPO Whistleblowers?

https://www.whistleblower.org/blog/122922-where-report-allegations-wipo-whistleblowers

Secret UN report finds against controversial WIPO chief

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/02/22/wipo_whistleblower_report/

Pressure grows on WIPO DG Gurry after submission of UN report and further explosive Pooley claims

http://www.iam-media.com/blog/Detail.aspx?g=b7e820d7-ba8f-4e30-a385-0aadd2315000

Pooley’s written testimony can be found here:
“Based on my experience I can report to you that the vast majority of the people at WIPO are competent, dedicated and deliver as required, many of them well beyond that. But this belies a profoundly serious problem with governance. The agency, in my opinion, is run by a single person who is not accountable for his behavior. He is able to rule as he does only with the tacit cooperation of member countries who are supposed to act as WIPO’s board of directors. And he is ultimately protected by an anachronistic shield of diplomatic immunity.”

http://docs.house.gov/meetings/FA/FA16/20160224/104528/HHRG-114-FA16-Wstate-PooleyJ-20160224.pdf

Miranda Brown’s testimony is here:

http://docs.house.gov/meetings/FA/FA16/20160224/104528/HHRG-114-FA16-Wstate-BrownM-20160224.pdf

Interestingly enough, we found two of the above reports ourselves (IAM and WIPR), but didn’t quite imagine that other people also noticed them. There is now another interesting dimension to explore; if there a connection (even if slight/meager) between what happens in WIPO and what happens inside the EPO (except the legal threats sent to bloggers in order to silence them)? Željko Topić might be just one link among several more that we just don’t know about (yet). █

Publicado in Fraude, Microsoft at 1:53 pm por el Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Pero no esperen que alguien de Microsoft sea sentenciado a pasar unos años en prisión (alas, es notorio)

Sumario: La epidemia de CORRUPCIÓN DE Microsoft es resaltada en una corte de leyes, pero ya que Microsoft es un moustrou bien conectado políticamente no esperamos castigo por tal comportamiento CRIMINAL

EL año pasado Microsoft fue atrapado chantajeando políticos Británicos [1, 2] y días atras escribimos acerca de su extorsión y chantaje (con patentes) contra Android OEMs.

El último fin de semana un lector nos hizo enterar de un viejo artículo que sobrepasamos al momento. Después de reportajes acerca de muchos casos de SOBORNO por parte de Microsoft (lo que lo trajo bajo una prueba en los Estados Unidos) escuchamos muy poco, como sí la investigación no era más investigada. Recuerden que el Presidente Obama fue ya pagado (algunos dicen sobornado) por Microsoft, which rápidamente uno de sus más altos contribuyentes antes de las elecciónes, como bien dijo Bill Gates, su esposa, Steve Ballmer y su esposa también. Haciéndo su influencia en le gobierno estadounidense pegajosa (vea nuestra página Wiki titulada ¨La influencia de Microsoft sobre el gobierno Estadounidense¨) seguramente que vale la pena.

Aquí esta el reporte de noticias titulado ¨Antiguo Ministro Rumano admite haber recibido un soborno de €4mn bribe in un caso de Microsoft” (recordándonos que Microsoft todavía es una COMPAÑÍA CRIMINAL). Dice:

El previo Ministro de Comunicaciones Rumano Gabriel Sandu admitió en una audiencia ante una corte el pasado Octubre 12 que recibió un soborno de €4mn en el llamado caso de Microsoft. Otros ocho previos ministros también estan bajo investigación en el caso, pero Sandu es el único en haber sido acusado por el momento.

Las implicaciones del caso permanecen inpredecibles, ya que envuelve ministros de tres gobiernos de varias orientaciones políticas. Fue instigada por el Primer Ministro Victor Ponta del Partido de Centro-Izquierda de Social Demócratas (PSD) quienes desearon una investigación sobre los contratos firmados bajo su predecesor y rival político Emil Boc durante el 2009-2012. Pero abrió la puerta a una más ancho escándalo que ha arrastrado a políticos de ambos partidos.

El Directorado Nacional Anticorrupción (DNA) empezó investigaciones sobre la venta de licensias de software para las escuelas Rumanas en Septiembre del 2014. Los nueve antiguos ministros son sospechosos de RECIBIR SOBORNOS A CAMBIO DE FIRMAR Y LUEGO EXTENDER CONTRATOS PARA LICENCIAR SOFTWARE DE mICROSOFT A PRECIOS MÁS ALTOS QUE EN EL MERCADO.

Sandu fué el primer previos ministro en dar su testimonio delante de la corte. Afirmó haber contribuído los €4mn de soborno que recibió al Partido de Centro-Derecha Demócratico Liberal (PNL) para su campaña electoral y la de Traian Basescu, el exitóso candidateo de las elecciones presidenciales del 2009.

“Eso es Rumania,” nos dijo un lector, ¨¿qué acerca de Rusia y los otros? ¿Cuál es el status?¨ Bueno, previamente escribimos acerca de Rumania en:

• Microsoft y Rumania: Persigan el Dinero
• Los ‘Vampiros’ de Microsoft Chupan la Sangre de Rumania OOXML Voters, Supporters
• Relleno de Balotas de Redmon Llena otra Conferencia de FOSS (Rumania)
• Cabeza de Microsoft en Rumania Renuncia, Entryismo Revisado
• Rumania Bajo Presión para Permitir Software Libre
• El Reino Unido Comparte el Dolor por la Exclusión del Software Libre de los Servicios Públicos
• Gobierno Rumano: Los Programas Son Mejores Con el Código Fuente
• Dan Bulucea, Director de Negocios y Mercade de Microsoft Rumania, Escapa y Entra a Google
• Microsoft Refuerza Su Status de Organización Criminal al Sobornar y Corromper Más Oficiales, Incluso en Europa
• Comentario: En Rumania, el Gobierno Sólo Sirve a Usuarios de Windows

Todavía esperamos por el resultado de las investigación de los Estados Unidos contra Microsoft (por corrupcción), pero permanecemos escépticos hasta que veamos la luz del dia. Microsoft tiene a MUCHOS CABILDEADORES E INCLUSOS POLÍTICOS EN SUS BOLSILLOS, como hemos cubierto a traves de los años extensivamente.

Rumania es simplemente uno de varios países donde Microsoft debería someterse a una extensiva examinación, incluso la EVASION DE IMPUESTOS que esperamos que el IRS finalmente lo tome más seriamente. En algunos de los articulos de arriba ya hemos discutido los trucos de contabilidad de Microsoft en Rumania.

Cuando leemos algo de lo de arriba se hace más evidente que Microsoft está básicamente ARRIBA DE LA LEY, rodeado de POLÍTICOS CORRUPTOS quienes están muy asustados (or envaselinados) para realmente hacer algo al respecto, sin mencionar sus socios que hacen mucho de su trabajo sucio (como fue el caso en los días de OOXML con elecciones ARREGLADAS). ¿Cuál es el ruido acerca de este ´nuevo´ Microsoft de todas maneras? Nada más que una sobreusada campaña de mercadeo y relaciones públicas, alrededor de las lineas: ¨Microsoft ama a Linux.¨

A la gente no le gusta Microsoft porque es bueno. A la gente típicamente le disgusta Microsoft por que ellos entienden la historia y saben que Microsoft es… bien, especial. █

Summary: The epidemic which is Microsoft corruption is highlighted in a court of law, but since Microsoft is a very politically-connected monster we expect no punishment for such criminal behaviour

LAST year Microsoft got caught blackmailing British politicians [1, 2] and days ago we wrote about extortion and blackmail (with patents) against Android OEMs.

Over the weekend a reader made us aware of an older article that we overlooked at the time. After reports about many cases of bribery by Microsoft (which came under a US probe for them) we heard very little, as if the investigation was no longer pursued. Remember that President Obama was already paid (some might say bribed) by Microsoft, which quickly one of his top funders before the elections, as well as by Bill Gates, his wife, Steve Ballmer, and his wife. Making one’s influence in the US government stick (see our Wiki page titled “Microsoft influence in the United States government“) surely pays off.

Here is the news report which is titled “Former Romanian minister admits taking €4mn bribe in Microsoft case” (reminding us that Microsoft is still a criminal company). It says:

Romania’s former communications minister Gabriel Sandu admitted at a court hearing on October 12 that he received a €4mn bribe in the so-called Microsoft case. Eight other former ministers are under investigation in the case, but Sandu is the only one to be indicted so far.

The implications of the case remain unpredictable, as it involves ministers from three governments of various political orientations. It was instigated by Prime Minister Victor Ponta of the centre-left Party of Social Democrats (PSD) who wanted an investigation into contracts signed under his predecessor and political rival Emil Boc in 2009-2012. But he opened the door into a much broader political scandal that has dragged in politicians of both parties.

The National Anticorruption Directorate (DNA) started investigations into the sales of educational software licences for Romanian schools in September 2014. The nine former ministers are suspected of receiving bribes in exchange for signing and later extending contracts to license Microsoft software at above market prices.

Sandu was the first former minister to give testimony in court. He claimed to have contributed the entire €4mn bribe he received to the centre-right Liberal Democrat Party (PNL) electoral campaign and to that of Traian Basescu, the party’s successful candidate in the 2009 presidential election.

“That’s Romania,” told us a reader, “what about Russia and the others? What’s the status?” Well, we previously wrote about Romania in:

• Microsoft and Romania: Follow the Money
• Microsoft ‘Vampires’ Suck Blood of Romania’s OOXML Voters, Supporters
• Ballot Stuffer from Redmond Stuffs Another FOSS Conference (Romania)
• Head of Microsoft Romania Quits, Entryism Revisited
• Romania Under Pressure to Allow Free/Libre Software
• The UK Shares Romania’s Pain as Free Software Excluded From Public Services
• Romanian Government: Programs Are Better With Source Code
• Dan Bulucea, Business and Marketing Director of Microsoft Romania, Escapes and Enters Google
• Microsoft Reinforces Its Criminal Organisation Status by Bribing and Corrupting More Officials, Even in Europe
• Commentary: In Romania, the Government Serves Just Windows Users

We still wait for the outcome of the US probe against Microsoft (for corruption), but we remain sceptical it will ever see the light of day. Microsoft has many lobbyists and even politicians in its pocket, as covered here extensively over the years.

Romania is just one of several countries where Microsoft should come under a very extensive probe, including into Microsoft tax evasion which the IRS finally takes more seriously. In some of the above articles we already discussed the accounting tricks of Microsoft in Romania.

When reading some of the above it becomes more evident that Microsoft is basically above the law, surrounded by corrupt politicians who are too afraid (or greased up) to actually do something about it, not to mention partners that do a lot of the dirty work (as was the case in the OOXML days with rigged elections). What’s this buzz about ‘new’ Microsoft anyway? Nothing but a tired old PR/marketing campaign, along the lines of “Microsoft loves Linux.”

People do not dislike Microsoft because it’s hip. People typically dislike Microsoft because they understand history and know that Microsoft is… well, special. █

AT the end of last year we wrote about the IRS setting its sight on Microsoft, in spite of Microsoft’s influence in the United States government. Microsoft then attacked the IRS using its lawyers, for merely investigating Microsoft (i.e. doing its job), thus wasting taxpayers money in the courts. Can anyone not see the sheer arrogance of Microsoft? Having already been caught engaging in serious financial fraud (reported to the authorities by an insider) and despite being notorious for taxation/tax violations, Microsoft thinks it has moral ground and believes it can sue the IRS for merely investigating a criminal. Criminal companies with the “God complex” apparently believe that they don’t need to pay tax (because they are very politically-connected) and if you say that they do, they threaten you and bully you. It’s a form of SLAPP (strategic lawsuit against public participation). Microsoft already loses billions of dollars and it sued the IRS for alleging that Microsoft owes billions of dollars to US citizens (easily provable).

This new article from The Register, based on legal documents, reveals the latest in this saga:

The ongoing squabble between Microsoft and the US Internal Revenue Service is heading to court, beginning with a hearing to take place in a Seattle federal court on Tuesday.

The case is gearing up to become one of the largest-ever legal battles between tax authorities and a US corporation over the practice of shifting assets to overseas subsidiaries as a way of avoiding US tax.

The IRS has alleged that deals Microsoft struck with subsidiaries in Bermuda and Puerto Rico between the years of 2004 and 2009 have potentially cost the US Treasury billions in tax revenue. But Redmond thinks the top tax agency’s snooping has gone on long enough and it should either produce a hard figure or drop the whole matter.

Microsoft also claims the IRS acted improperly when it hired two outside law firms to help it in its investigation, which the software giant describes as improperly delegating a government function to a private firm.

Microsoft has filed two Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests to see documents exchanged between the IRS and the law firms it contracted, including Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan and Boies Schiller & Flexner. The IRS has provided some such documents but Microsoft thinks it should be compelled to produce more.

Even if Microsoft goes bankrupt (it suffers losses already), people like Bill Gates, who became rich owing to the company’s criminal activities, should be able to (if not forced to) pay what was looted from the public. More of the corporate media should have the courage to cover the above news, but seeing how Microsoft uses SLAPP against the messengers, maybe the media chooses to stay silence and let only official documents (buried behind paywalls) speak. █

“We’ve got to put a lot of money into changing behavior.”

–Bill Gates

Summary: As German authorities express eagerness to crack down on corruption calls emerge for action against the Munich-based EPO, where Battistelli acts like an out-of-control autocrat who tries to silence the media and conceal information about Topić’s and his own abuses

The EPO tried to reassure staff that it was obeying the law whilst attacking the media after it had hired a military-connected company to spy on critics (we are still under heavy DDOS attacks at this very moment and many of the offending addresses have historically come from within Lockheed Martin). It’s not going to help the EPO because they are merely sinking deeper in a scandal which they themselves started. The EPO is now cracking down on sources of information (about abuse) rather than crack down on sources of abuse at the EPO. It’s symptomatic of the last, miserable effort by an abusive autocracy to defend itself from the public. The days of the EPO (in its current shape and roster) ought to be numbered, but only if governments actually do their job and intervene. The EPO is structured like a lawless state within a state, but surely it is not entirely immune to outside scrutiny. An thorough (and independent) investigation is long overdue. The German authorities are best equipped to do so.

Read this new comparison from football and software lobbyist Florian Müller. He compares the abuses at FIFA to the abuses at the EPO, naming for example the corruption. To quote one portion: “FIFA officials have been linked to bribery for many years. If you’re interested in the longstanding history of corruption in soccer, I recommend this book: “FOUL! The secret world of FIFA: Bribes, vote rigging and ticket scandals” by Andrew Jennings. One of the officials arrested last month, Jack Warner, also features prominently in that masterpiece of investigative journalism. However, as far as criminal charges (whether they will ultimately be proven is another question in all those cases) are concerned, the EPO also has its Jack Warner and his name is Željko Topić. You can read about the related allegations and accusations on Wikipedia, TechRights, IP-Watch and other sites.

“So, Battistelli is visiting the place where alleged corruption from his right-hand man (many criminal charges with a court’s ruling serving to reinforce this) has truly become a headache. How telling…”“If the Administrative Council of the EPOrg was as concerned about the reputation of the EPO as the supervisory bodies of honorable organizations are, they would have ousted a vice president at the latest after he lost a Croatian court case trying to prevent a journalist from making certain claims. But with little attention in mass media (at least outside of Croatia), he can stay in office, which says a lot about the mentality of the decision-makers there. Do you believe the European Central Bank would let a vice president stay in office after being accused of counterfeiting? What this EPO vice president is accused of is the IP equivalent of what counterfeiting would mean for a banker.”

Here is the EPO calendar. The next meeting of the Administrative Council (the President’s guardian rather than independent overseer) is on the 24th and 25th of June — a meeting to take place in Munich, Germany. We have incidentally heard from our sources in Zagreb that Battistelli is planning a visit to the Croatian State Intellectual Property Office (together with Željko Topić) in July.

So, Battistelli is visiting the place where alleged corruption from his right-hand man (many criminal charges with a court's ruling serving to reinforce this) has truly become a headache? How telling…

Going back to Müller’s comparison, there is a part in it which alludes to paid (planted) articles and extravagant awards which we last covered a few days ago. He writes: “When “non-profits” like FIFA and the EPO control billions of dollars/euros, they inevitably look for ways to spend them in ways that could be characterized as self-aggrandizement. They hire famous architects to design new buildings for them, and they throw expensive parties. Here, again, FIFA’s Ballon d’Or award ceremony at least serves an obvious and legitimate commercial purpose, while the EPO’s European Inventor Award is a major disgrace in ethical terms. I agree with the criticism voiced in this IPKat post. This is indeed a “dangerous compromise of principle.” The EPO must be neutral, but it is not. Instead of taking measures that would really contribute to patent quality, it compromises the process as a whole. It crosses the line all the time between what is appropriate for a governmental organization and behavior that would only be acceptable for a private enterprise.”

In Germany, tells us a reader, action is now needed. “The Federal Minister of Justice Heiko Maas calls for more resources for the parliamentary oversight of intelligence services,” to quote directly. “Federal Minister of Justice Heiko Maas (SPD) has called for a more comprehensive monitoring of the Federal Intelligence Service (BND). ’We need the whole activity of the BND subject to democratic control’, Maas said the ’Welt am Sonntag’.’ There must be no lawless areas for secret services.’”

What about the EPO and the bullies it hired to assault the rights of staff? Not to mention an attack on journalists and news sites…

Christoph Ernst is brought up as well. A reader told us that this “German Ministry of Justice is also responsible for oversight of the EPO through its national delegate on the EPO’s Administrative Council, Dr. Christoph Ernst.”

There is a lot of interest in cracking down on FIFA corruption (timing chosen for arguably political and partisan reasons), but what about the EPO?

“What a pity Heiko Maas doesn’t seems to show the same level of interest in the oversight of the EPO,” tells us a reader. “At least he has “tweeted” his intention to combat corruption in the world of football” (“Korruption darf im Fußball keinen Platz haben. Vorwürfe gg #FIFA müssen endlich umfassend aufgeklärt werden. Fußball kein rechtsfreier Raum.”), leading to press coverage such as “German justice minister urges new start at FIFA without Blatter”.

FIFA has had a reputation for corruption for quite some time (probably decades if not just years), but the EPO is going down the same route and a crackdown on it shouldn’t take as long as it took to tackle FIFA. █

Summary: Battistelli faces yet another embarrassment as the man who defended his assaults on EPO staff, Ivo Opstelten, turns out to be little more than a thug in a suit

WHY does Battistelli tend to find himself surrounded by thugs and corrupt officials? Željko Topić, EPO Vice-President and Battistelli's right-hand man, faces many criminal charges. And that’s just one of several men. Perhaps it takes thugs to defend a thug, but the reasons could go deeper than this when exploring the networks and power of influence, especially in Europe. Battistelli is strongly connected to ENA (Ecole Nationale d’Administration) and there seems to be a link between Topić and Ivan Šimonović, both of whom are strongly linked to Ivo Sanader, who is in prison.

The Dutch Justice Minister, Ivo Opstelten (not to be mixed with Ivo Sanader), who intervened to prevent execution of the judgment in favour of EPO staff, fits a pattern.

“Newsflash from the Netherlands,” told us a reader nearly a month ago, “Dutch ministers Opstelten and Teeven quit over payment to drug-trafficker” (quitting under such circumstances can help evade legal action).

Links to some news reports (British and Dutch media):

• BBC: Dutch ministers Opstelten and Teeven quit over payment to drug-trafficker
• Dutch News: Dutch justice minister, deputy resign over drugs dealer cash deal
• Dutch News: Opstelten, Teeven in firing line as missing drugs cash receipt ‘turns up’: Telegraaf

To quote the BBC, “Dutch Justice Minister Ivo Opstelten and his state secretary, Fred Teeven, have resigned after misleading parliament over a 2001 compensation payment to a convicted drug trafficker.”

So here, once again, Battistelli is basically defended by a bunch of opportunistic corrupt/crooked people in positions of power. █

Summary: The now disgraced (having just resigned) Ivo Opstelten played a role in helping Benoît Battistelli crush his staff

The European Patent Office (EPO) — especially its management as opposed to patent examiners– has indulged in relative calm this past week. What it does not know is that there is still have plenty of exclusive coverage coming and it’s not going to like it. These problems cannot be resolved with words but only with actions.

The EPO‘s management, namely Battistelli and his cronies, are on the retreat from EPO staff. The staff arguably has the upper hand now, so it will be getting its demands met one way or another.

Merpel from IP Kat delivered a sort of interlude at the end of last week, saying: “By recognising both the “social unease” that exists in the EPO and by timetabling the need to address it, this month’s Administrative Council Meeting appears to have provided at least a basis for the various interested parties — the President, Boards of Appeal, management, staff and unions, and also the members of the Administrative Council themselves if truth be told — to start afresh by building relationships that are founded on respect, on tolerance and understanding, on listening to one another, plus a leavening dose of humility.

“The outcome of the Administrative Council Meeting will certainly not be to everyone’s liking. For one thing, it approved the controversial healthcare reforms which, viewed from the standpoint of an objective bystander, appear to be one of the most significant causes of the “social unrest” and which will remain a permanent obstacle to its being remedied. Nor will its acceptance of the proposal for a Board of Appeal Committee, in the face of some sensible and constructive criticisms from the Praesidium and Board members, have done much to enhance respect or confidence for the Council itself. However, a door has been opened and a small step has been taken in the right direction. The question to ask now is whether, now that this opportunity has been created, it will be taken and built upon — or mocked and spurned.

“It is easy to be sceptical and to say that something won’t work, particularly if you can do it anonymously by penning comments on a blogpost. It’s also rather fun to be able to say to anyone who can be bothered to listen “See, it didn’t work. I told you so!” It’s far harder to swallow one’s pride, sit down with people you have not hitherto liked, trusted or respected, and talk through the problems that the EPO has to address, both those which it always has to face and those which it has recently created for itself. But that is what this Kat is calling for.”

EPO scandals should not be left in the past and treated as ‘old news’ because the core issues, including corruption, have not been addressed yet. Some recent articles from the Süddeutsche Zeitung serve to remind us of the profound issues at the EPO.

“We hope that you are enjoying your time in Singapore,” wrote to us a source some weeks ago when sending us translations of Süddeutsche Zeitung articles. “For your information just to keep you up to date with recent developments,” wrote this source, two recent articles from the Süddeutsche Zeitung (with English translations) were sent, accompanying the originals in Dutch.

The first one [PDF] (25^th of February) is about the planned demonstration at the British Consulate in Munich (a demonstration which was called off following threats from Battistelli). Here is the English translation:

Süddeutsche Zeitung – Wednesday, 25 February 2015

An Inexorable Conflict

EPO staff call off an officially approved demonstration – because the President bans it

On one occasion, such a large number of staff – reportedly 2000 – arrived with their banners and placards that the police had to cordon off the street in front of the building with the
dark glass façade beside the Isar. They had taken to the streets to protest against the management style of the man who sits – some would say “resides” – on the top floor: Benoît Battistelli, President of the European Patent Office (EPO), an international organisation with its very own rules – “a state within a state”. A state which for quite some time now has been
in a virtual state of war.

All those who object to Battistelli’s new rules had planned to march again today. The route along the Isar would have brought them to the British Consulate General, just like previous actions which had taken place at the French and Danish Consulates. The EPO’s Staff Union SUEPO unexpectedly called off the officially approved demonstration: not of its own volition, however, but because the President had threatened the demonstrators with massive disciplinary consequences. This is confirmed by a document which the Süddeutsche Zeitung has seen. The Office management claimed that the demonstration was “contrary to the interests of the Office” and was likely to damage the EPO’s reputation. Staff members participating in the organisation of the demonstration were warned that they were in breach of the legal framework applicable to their contracts. In a letter to SUEPO, the President stated that the organisers would be held liable for their actions.

This de facto demonstration ban represents a new peak in a conflict whose intensity has been escalating during recent months. It is a conflict which has by now reached a point
where not even senior EPO representatives see any hope of a resolution. For quite some time now staff representatives have been fighting against the President and his plans for reform. The aim of these reforms is to provide a more efficient and cost-effective management of the Office – and one aspect of this involves tackling certain long-established “perks” which date from the early days of the EPO and which until now have contributed to attractive remuneration and working conditions. Time and time again, EPO staff have protested against what they consider to be the excessively brusque manner in which these reforms have been forced through. They have taken to the streets and in the weeks before Christmas they engaged in a strike action, albeit with diminishing participation towards the end. According to staff representatives this was due to increased internal surveillance and repression by management.

Photo Caption:

The Frenchman Benoit Battistelli will remain at the head of the European Patent Office until 2018. However, his management style has been the subject of harsh criticism.

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The demonstrators have consistently emphasised that as far as they are concerned, this is not about money but rather about their fundamental rights, such as the freedom of expression. They consider that these rights have been increasingly curtailed by the President. Meanwhile, in attempting to justify the demonstration ban, Battistelli did not cite the attacks on his person and management style but referred instead to those directed against the two British delegates on the Administrative Council, the only supervisory body to which the President is subordinate. This body which is composed of delegates from the EPO member states is considered by its critics to be too much under the sway of the President. On a number of recent occasions, it has bolstered Battistelli, in particular by prematurely extending his term of office until 2018.

For this reason, the Staff Union wrote to the British Consulate General at the beginning of February and requested a discussion: not just about the President but also about what they considered to be the overly uncritical stance of the British delegation. Battistelli interpreted this as a personal attack on the two representatives of a member state. Moreover, discussions with member states are exclusively a matter for the Office – and by “Office” Battistelli means those at the top, i.e. himself. The EPO was unable to provide an answer to our question as to why Battistelli only decided to intervene now and why he did not raise any objection to previous demonstrations and letters to diplomatic representatives.

The second one [PDF] (27^th of February) is about the Dutch court judgment and the intervention by the Dutch Justice Minister to prevent execution of the Judgment. There are more documents and comments about this on the public website of SUEPO. Here is the English translation:

Süddeutsche Zeitung – Friday, 27 February 2015

Being in the right is no guarantee of obtaining satisfaction

Following a reprimand by a Dutch court, the European Patent Office strikes back

Berlin – A Court of Appeal in the Netherlands has ordered the European Patent Office (EPO) to engage in collective bargaining with the Staff Union. In addition to this, the EPO is required to cease blocking emails from staff representatives and to desist from threatening Staff Union activists with disciplinary measures. With this development, the conflict between EPO staff and the President Battistelli has reached a new level of intensity. The Appeal Court (“Gerechtshof”) in the Hague has officially declared that the EPO violated the fundamental rights of its staff. The Staff Union known as “SUEPO” had no means of legal redress available to it.

The judgment opens up a new chapter of legal history because until now it was generally accepted that the EPO, as an international organisation, enjoyed immunity from the jurisdiction of national courts. Battistelli consistently emphasised this, in particular in connection with the reforms which he has been implementing in the Office during the last few years. He claimed
that he wanted to do away with long-standing privileges enjoyed by staff and that he had the support of the representatives of the 38 member states of the Organisation. Staff representatives and Union activists, however, complained that the changes led to restrictions of their fundamental rights, for example with respect to Union activities and industrial action. The headquarters of the EPO are in Munich and it also has large sub-offices in Berlin, Vienna and the Hague.

“It was quite an unusual decision”, the attorney representing the Staff Union, Prof. Liesbeth Zegveld, says about the judgment. “The EPO had, however, behaved badly because it did not recognise SUEPO as a social partner”. The EPO management on the other hand rejects the judgment of the Appeal Court as an encroachment. The judges had “decided not to respect the
fundamental principle of immunity” wrote the EPO President in a Communiqué to his staff. “This judgement is neither legally admissible nor practically enforceable”.

In order to ensure that its point of view prevailed, it would appear that the EPO Administration brought pressure to bear on the Dutch authorities. A spokesperson for the Dutch Ministry of
External Affairs confirmed this version of events in response to a query from the Süddeutsche Zeitung. The Dutch Government now takes the position that although the EPO is not immune from the jurisdiction of the courts in its conflict with the Staff Union, it nevertheless enjoys immunity from execution of the judgment. The Ministry of Justice ordered the Court Bailiff not to proceed with the execution. “The Ministry of External Affairs has confirmed to us that the judgment failed to take account of the international legal obligations of the [Dutch] State”, said the EPO press officer, Rainer Osterwalder.

What will happen next is unclear. On one hand, the EPO may refer the matter to the next instance, the Supreme Court of the Netherlands. On the other hand, SUEPO attorney Liesbeth Zegveld is currently considering taking legal action against the [Dutch] State which, in her opinion, is obstructing its own justice system. It is possible that a similar lawsuit could succeed before the German courts.

“The European states, including Germany, should never have ratified the Convention relating to the European Patent Office,” says Siegfried Broß, a former judge of the German Constitutional Court, “because it places the fundamental and human rights of EPO employees at the disposition of the Office Administration.”

The Dutch Socialist Party has also issued a statement calling on the Dutch government not to tolerate human rights abuses at the EPO. To quote the summary alone: “The Court of Justice in The Hague last week ruled that the European Patents Organisation (EPO) is in conflict with important European fundamental rights, such as the right to strike. Security and Justice Minister Ivo Opstelten is, however, refusing to give effect to the judgment, on the grounds that the EPO – not an EU institution, but one with thirty-eight member states, including all EU countries – is an independent organisation and therefore enjoys immunity. SP Member of Parliament Michiel van Nispen finds this reasoning absurd, he says. ‘The minister is thus approving the silencing of trade unions and the fact that workers can’t in the end enforce their rights,’ he points out. ‘Independent organisations should not be hampered in their functioning, but that doesn’t mean that they have carte blanche to transgress human rights and ignore judicial rulings.’”

In imminent articles we are going to show that even Battistelli’s defence, namely Opstelten, is itself corrupt. There is much that can be deduced from it. █

We very recently published a video segment (extracted from a programme of one Croatian TV network) about a man called Rikard Frgačić, whose case against EPO Vice-President Željko Topić we had previously covered in the following three posts:

1. The Case of Rikard Frgacic Versus the Croatian SIPO: Allegation of Corruption in Relation to Trademark Reassignment Under Željko Topić’s Watch: Part XVI
2. Just in: Fresh Call From Croatia to Arrest EPO Vice-President Željko Topić
3. Željko Topić’s History in SIPO Leaves a Legacy of Alleged DZIV Vehicles (Bribes), Authorship Abuses, and Intimidation Against Reporters

Today we wish to expand and to explain what the case is about. We have been in contact with the plaintiff and interviewed him over the telephone. We also received additional documents that help explain his case. The following additional programme segment helps explain it primarily from the Lufthansa angle.

Mr. Frgačić kindly provided us with detailed information about his case and in particular, especially towards the end, the special role of Željko Topić. Below is his explanation, unaltered so as to preserve his narrative.

In accordance with the article entitled “The Case of Rikard Frgacic Versus the Croatian SIPO: Allegation of Corruption in Relation to Trademark Reassignment Under Željko Topić’s Watch”, posted on the Internet portal http://techrights.org on 15th February 2015, under the programme section “Europe/Patents”, and with an aim of providing objective and thorough information to the international public, I kindly ask you to publish my comment on the article as follows:

My legal dispute with the subsidiary of the big German corporation Lufthansa AG – Lufthansa Airplus Servicekarten G.m.b.H. is not benign at all. All the more so when one lives in a banana republic called Croatia, very similar by its judicial system and public administration system to some underdeveloped African countries in terms of the level of corruption.

One of the reasons why I mention this hides in the fact of the name of a person holding a master’s degree title – Mister Željko Topić involved with the former State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO) of the Republic of Croatia. As a citizen, I could accept the fact of being conned by an individual, but unfortunately, I cannot accept it being done by the state system. Nevertheless, given the involvement in corruption of the above-mentioned airline company registered in an EU Member State, since recently this case has also been tackled by the EU institutions based in Brussels, entrusted with its in-depth monitoring.

But, let us start from the very beginning. With reference to the facts written in your article, which are accurate: Lufthansa did offer me a value of the second-hand mountain bike to buy ownership over my internationally protected brand Air Plus. What is extremely important to highlight here is the fact that Lufthansa’s offer would not have been given had there not been any abuse of my trademark/brand. A proof of my international ownership over the Air Plus brand was issued by the OMPI/WIPO in Geneva.

Why do I mention this? On my return flight with a four-member family from a business and tourist trip in the USA, that is, from New York to Zagreb in 2007, at the JFK Airport Lufthansa gave us a flyer with an interesting offer to postpone our flight for a couple of hours and receive EUR 700.00 compensation per person. In other words, EUR 2,800.00 for the four of us to delay our flight to Europe for a couple of hours. Lufthansa’s offer was rejected, and the return flight from New York to Zagreb was partially made by another airline company. My guess is that due to malfunctioning IT booking system and ongoing overbooking, as well as due to a fear of potential claims, Lufthansa provides interesting compensation to the passengers stalking them at airport counters prior to their flights and offering them cash vouchers. In the attachment, you can find the proof of such farce taking place at the JFK Airport in New York, the original Lufthansa flyer.

[Click to enlarge]

Based on the above-mentioned, I think any further comment is superfluous.

Under such circumstances and failed negotiations between me and Lufthansa, which have been carried out by my attorney in Munich (the letter is a PDF) to date, in 2010 the court proceedings were initiated for indemnification at the Commercial Court in Zagreb under number P-710/2010.

Simultaneously, the German Stock Exchange, German Patent Office in Munich, the President of the Lufthansa Supervisory Board and Assembly were notified accordingly. The document enclosed (2 pages below), and which document was submitted to the German Patent Office in Munich, indicates a very high value of the dispute amounting to EUR 30 million.

Unfortunately, the Attorneys-at-Law who represented me initially in Zagreb represent me no longer as it turned out that at the same time they also represented Mister Željko Topić, former SIPO Director General, current EPO Vice-President in Munich. The proof (power of attorney of Željko Topić) of the above-mentioned allegations is also enclosed in the attachment. For the time being I have not brought any action for indemnification and criminal action against the Attorneys-at-Law who knowingly found themselves in the conflict of interest.

In the forthcoming period the instigation of court proceedings against Lufthansa in Germany is expected (due to the statute of limitation the deadline for the claim in Germany is May 2016), after completion of the case with the SIPO in Zagreb initiated based on fictitious charges of Lufthansa claiming that my Air Plus brand had not been in use, which, naturally, was not true. The charade at the SIPO of the Republic of Croatia was organised by Lufthansa Attorney in the Republic of Croatia and above-mentioned corrupt Željko Topić, former SIPO Director General who used a well-established scheme to settle the Lufthansa’s charges within a record time of a single day. Of course, in favour of Lufthansa. The criminal charges were pressed against both actors with the State Attorney’s Office of the Republic of Croatia (DORH in Croatian), which were subsequently taken over by the Croatian Office for the Prevention of Corruption and Organised Crime (USKOK in Croatian) on account of severe qualifications of a criminal offence. On its own initiative, the SIPO, then headed by Željko Topić, without any legal grounds made a reassignment of my protected brand in the official registry and posted such reassignment on its official website, which is one of the reasons for criminal charges as it has nothing to do with violation of my personal rights, but violation of Croatian law and international law and violation of the principle of trust in credible records in a public registry. After my appeal and media coverage of the entire case, the SIPO quashed its first instance decision and pronounced Lufthansa’s charges as unfounded. However, six years after such event, which was settled for Lufthansa within a remarkable single day, I still have not received the final decision of Topić’s ex-SIPO with the accompanying documentation. My total legal costs of the dispute with Lufthansa exceed EUR 50.000.-. At the moment there are five attorneys representing me in the proceedings against Lufthansa. One in each of the respective cities: Munich, Ljubljana and Paris and two attorneys in Zagreb specialised in commercial law and intellectual property law. It should be highlighted here that the letter of Lufthansa’s representatives of 24th July 2009 addressed at my attorney in Munich evidently shows the outcome of the proceedings with the SIPO in Zagreb a couple of months in advance. This letter is crucial evidence which takes Mister Željko Topić, and Lufthansa’s representative in Croatia and all others involved in this case directly to prison with a request for precise answers regarding operation of the “high-level corrupt octopus” in practice.

The project under the Air Plus trademark was a big tourist vision as shown in the letter for the Airbus consortium in France way back in 1998 with the graphical design of the Air Plus brand on the Airbus plane model A-319, also below.

Throughout the last couple of years I gave a number of interviews laying stress on the issue of intellectual property in the case with Lufthansa, but also more broadly speaking. In particular, I would like to single out two TV shows for the Croatian public broadcasting company (HRT), also shown above as video-clips with English subtitles.
According to some unofficial information there is a closed circle of indications that Lufthansa is a secret owner of the Croatian airline company Croatia Airlines, and thus my case crosses the borders of judiciary and becomes a political “burning issue” in the currently unresolved relations between Germany and Croatia. That was the basic reason why I addressed Chancellor of the Republic of Germany, Madam Angela Merkel (the letter is below).

By leaving the Croatian SIPO and coming to the EPO, whether by accident or not, Master of Science Željko Topić appointed Ms. Ljiljana Kuterovac, allegedly his longtime mistress, as the SIPO Director General in Zagreb. But he did not stop there as can be seen from a bizarre detail that very soon he also brought the foregoing lady that is his mistress to the EPO in Munich (information here) and turned this reputable international institution into a Balkan tavern equal to the one he had in a coffee bar “Valeatis” in Zagreb, close to his official office in the SIPO, and which is very precisely described and documented in a website article “A wrong man sitting at the EPO?”. To use the police investigation lingo, a very simple and logical question is raised here – Who made it all possible to him?

I would also like to emphasise that the corrupt network in this case surpasses Željko Topić and his current EPO position and assumes bigger proportions, including the WIPO in Geneva and leaning onto segments of the Croatian diplomacy. More specifically, after publication of the newspaper article “Vesna Vuković welcomes Topić in Geneva whom she ardently reported to DORH and USKOK” (see this) the foregoing lady fearing political retaliation apologised to “Master of Science” Željko Topić by phone from the Embassy of the Republic of Croatia in Geneva. This interesting telephone conversation on the Geneva – Munich line was intercepted by the Security and Intelligence Agency (SOA in Croatian) of the Republic of Croatia. Specifically, Ambassador Vuković (diplomatic passport is above) was not appointed to go to Geneva on behalf of the Republic of Croatia for diplomacy but as an extended hand of the former President of the Republic of Croatia – Ivo Josipović with the WIPO, since Geneva is an international bureau for the protection of author’s rights but also any other intellectual property rights (information here). It is no secret that the former President of the Republic of Croatia – Josipović is a covert owner that is the most influential person of the Croatian Composers’ Society (HDS/ZAMP in Croatian) with non-transparent parafiscal levies on account of which he probably lost the last presidential elections in the Republic of Croatia less than a month ago. Miss Vesna Vuković, together with corrupt Željko Topić, is a part of the systematically built “network” of former President of the Republic of Croatia, Ivo Josipović. Finally, former Minister of Science of the Republic of Croatia, Željko Jovanović, himself publicly admitted to a DW journalist the pressure of President of the Republic of Croatia Ivo Josipović in case of protection of Željko Topić against criminal prosecution, which was published in her article entitled “Croatian Patent for Author’s Rights” (see this).

According to the latest news from the Croatian independent media, the DORH system also constitutes a part of this sophisticated corrupt network, the head of which, the first man of that institution, Mladen Bajić, was recently removed from office. After Bajić’s deposition, the first attorney – Željka Pokupec of the County State Attorney’s Office (ŽDO in Croatian) based in the capital of the Republic of Croatia was removed from office and sacked. The Croatian public is anxious to see further clarification of matters in this state institution in the upcoming days. The role of the DORH in this fascinatingly built corrupt network at the high political level was regular collection of fees for Josipović’s HDS/ZAMP. In other words, the use of public resources of the Republic of Croatia for private purposes, as well as a potential cover-up of criminal offences of Željko Topić and obstruction of investigations by the very same persons at the top of the pyramid of the Republic of Croatia over former Chief State Attorney Mladen Bajić and his right hand Željka Pokupec, and over former President of the Republic of Croatia – Ivo Josipović. However, the way things are at the moment it seems that the former Prime Minister of the Republic of Croatia – Ivo Sanader convicted on account of crimes of corruption as a high ranking politician will soon get some company in the most famous prison in Croatia. Publicly pronounced word is said to be stronger than a baton, but this history folk saying is yet to be verified in this specific case.

In Zagreb, 20th February 2015

Written by: Rikard Frgacic, M.Sc. Geo.

It should be in the interest of EPO staff to know this, irrespective of the relevance of this trademark case to the patent system. █

OUR SECOND ARTICLE in this series (part of a much broader series) looks at the case of Rikard Frgacic and another of Ivan Kabalin. These cases help highlight the malicious conduct of the Croatian SIPO, which the current Vice-President of the EPO came from and also managed. Željko Topić does not want the European public to know about all this. He relies on much of this being accessible only to people who are fluent in Croatian. We strive to change this by providing translations, documents, and detailed explanations, having studied these cases for months.

“It is not possible for the EPO to just carry on when a thug and a cheater serves as Vice-President.”EPO matters will surely be impacted by this. It is not possible for the EPO to just carry on when a thug and a cheater serves as Vice-President. Today we present some background information about other Croatian cases that would be of interest to the European public.

“For your information,” told us a reliable source (we shall refer to our sources collectively for their protection), “[w]e have heard from our sources in Zagreb that some people in Croatia may try to contact you to provide information about other allegations of corruption against the Croatian State Intellectual Property Office during Topić’s tenure as Director-General (from 2004 to 2012).

“To try and help you to make some sense of all this let’s recap that so far the information which has been provided from our side has mostly related to the Vesna Stilin story and her conflict with Topić as an Assistant Director of the SIPO.

“It seems that a number of “external users” of the SIPO’s services also had problems. Two cases in particular have received journalistic coverage in Croatia. As far as we can work out, the people who might try to contact you to provide additional material are connected with those cases [and] the cases in question are as follows.”

This is a good point in time to clarify and strongly stress that in Techrights we have never let our sources down (and we have had many sources over the years). Those who have material to show to us can rest assured that they will be treated with utmost confidentially and material will be examined based on merit before publication (we ensure there is no identifying details in published documents, just in case). Today’s new documents are as follows:

1. PRESS RELEASE 30-04-2012-EN [PDF] – Translation of a “Press Release” dated 30th of April 2012, which was published on the Web site of the Croatian SIPO (in Croatian only). The original version (i.e. in Croatian) can be found here [PDF].
2. PLR-EN [PDF] – Translation of an article from dnevno.hr which includes a claim that Željko Topić was the author of the SIPO “Press Release” dated 30 April 2012; refer to the section entitled “Official or private website?”

Our first case deals with Mr. Rikard Frgacic.

“Mr. Frgacic is involved in a dispute with a subsidiary of Lufthansa in connection with a trademark “AirPlus”,” said a source to us. “Frgacic claims that the trademark registration in his name was mysteriously and improperly cancelled by the Croatian SIPO and re-assigned to Lufthansa (or, perhaps more precisely, a subsidiary of Lufthansa). He has been involved in litigation against the Croatian SIPO (in Croatia) and against Lufthansa and/or its subsidiary in Germany. As far as we can work out, he has also filed criminal charges against Topic in Croatia. At the beginning, Lufthansa offered him 1000 Euro to settle the trademark dispute but he refused the offer (as he considered that there was considerably more at stake).”

This is probably just one of many criminal charges against Željko Topić in his home country.

“According to what we have heard,” said our source, “he has had a partial victory in Croatia where a court issued an order for the SIPO to re-open the case of the trademark reassignment. However, the SIPO seems to be dragging its feet in the matter. It also looks like the litigation in Germany against Lufthansa and/or its subsidiary is stayed pending the outcome of the re-examination of the trademark re-assignment by the Croatian SIPO. From what we have understood, there seems to be a risk that if the SIPO blocks the re-examination of the case for long enough in Croatia, he may run into some kind of statute of limitations problem in Germany. But we only have this information via second-hand sources so we can’t say for sure what the exact state of play is.”

So, in summary, this case is not finished. Moreover, as we have explained before, there is a pattern of coverup for misconduct in SIPO. We wrote about that last week.

The second case involved Mr. Ivan Kabalin, whose letter we published some days ago (he too alleges coverup).

“Mr. Kabalin is a Croatian engineer who invented an improved type of safety razor and submitted a patent application for his invention to the Croatian SIPO,” our source explained. “Kabalin claims that his idea was subsequently pirated by Gillette and marketed as its “Gillette Sensor Excel” product. It seems that when he tried to pursue legal action against Gillette he found out that his patent application had not been properly processed by the SIPO. We are not sure of the exact details about this, i.e. whether they rejected the application or just left it hanging as a “pending application”. Whatever the exact story there, it turned out that he couldn’t obtain any effective legal enforcement against Gillette.”

Kabalin’s story has been covered in the Croatian press for many years now. NISTA_EN (published earlier this month) is a translation we have received of an article from 2013. Here is it as HTML. It’s a translation of an article from tjedno.hr which starts off with the Kabalin case before moving on to report about other matters relating to Željko Topić’s record.

“More recently it has received renewed coverage,” said our source, citing this page (publication date is 7th of November 2014, but no translation is available). The headline on that article, as we have been told, reads: “THE GILLETTE AFFAIR: One of the biggest heists in Croatian history is still continuing!”

Some older articles can be found here and here (no translations available) and in this interview with Kabalin from 2012 (again no translation available) the headline quotes him as saying that the whole of the SIPO “should be sent to Remetinec” (i.e. the main jailhouse in Zagreb).

We have heard something similar from Frgacic, who said in a recent interview that German authorities ought to arrest Željko Topić.

Our source added the following important disclaimer about the aforementioned cases: “We want to emphasise that we only know about the Frgacic and Kabalin cases from second-hand sources. These guys obviously have axes to grind with the SIPO but we are too remote from their cases to make any comments on the merits of their claims.

“However, the “David versus Goliath” aspect of these stories seems to have struck a chord with the popular imagination in Croatia and both cases have got a significant amount of media attention there. We also note that the ongoing controversy about Topić’s appointment at the EPO also seems to have regenerated interest in these “cold cases” in Croatia. Understandably, the people involved in these cases are interested in obtaining some exposure on an international level.

“As you might expect, the official “party line” of the SIPO (i.e. Topić) is to dismiss these people as disgruntled “cranks”. For example, the Frgacic case is mentioned in a press release from the Croatian SIPO dated 30 April 2012.” (see PRESS RELEASE 30-04-2012-EN and refer to the first paragraph on the last page).

Here is the full text of the press release, which is alleged to have been written by Topić:

REPUBLIC OF CROATIA

STATE INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY OFFICE

Zagreb, 30 April 2012

PRESS RELEASE

Following a series of articles in the media, among which “Jutarnji list” and the Internet portal Index.hr have been particularly prominent, and in which arbitrary allegations have been levelled in an outrageous manner against the former Director General of the State Intellectual Property Office, Mr Topić, and against the activities of the Office as an institution, the State Intellectual Property Office is publishing the following press release with the aim of objectively and truthfully informing the public and preventing further misrepresentation by the media.

The so-called “affair” relating to Director General Topić is nothing more than the product of unprofessional journalism which, in its search for a sensational story, publishes incomplete information, unverified information and even complete disinformation, to which a completely arbitrary and tendentious interpretation is applied.

The main source of accusations against the Office and against Mr Topić personally is the unprecedented campaign conducted by Ms Vesna Stilin, who was dismissed from service in the Office at the beginning of 1999 by the then Director due to unauthorised absence from duty for a duration of 34 consecutive days. For over 12 years she has been exerting unrelenting pressure on the competent government and judicial authorities in an attempt to realise her own unfounded ambitions and interests while trying to depict the matter as a struggle against illegal activities of the Office. We emphasise that from 1999 until the present day Ms Stilin has instituted dozens of court proceedings against several directors of the Office, the Office as an institution and the Croatian state in which inter alia she has claimed huge sums of money which are purportedly owed to her by the Office and the Croatian state. Ms Stilin’s arbitrary and malicious allegations concerning irregularities in the Office’s operations have, unfortunately, fallen on fruitful soil created by the current atmosphere of public distrust towards state institutions due to the intensified fight against corruption in recent years. In addition to this, arbitrary allegations by malicious individuals driven by questionable motives are published uncritically as facts by an unprofessional media and without any prior verification or objective analysis.

In the context of the aforementioned unprecedented campaign by Ms Stilin who, on an almost daily basis for the past 4 years, has been filing various absurd submissions, including criminal
charges, against Mr Topić and the Office with government and judicial authorities, a report relating to a budgetary inspection of the Office’s operations conducted in 2008 has been published. The contents of this report have provided the basis for media misrepresentation concerning alleged financial malpractices at the Office.

The aforementioned report has been interpreted in an arbitrary manner, without any appreciation of its contents and context, which we now elaborate upon with the aim of clarifying this matter.

Due to the monopolistic nature of intellectual property rights and the complex procedures for their protection, and in accordance with generally accepted global standards, it has been prescribed that not only the usual state duties are to be paid in connection with these procedures, but, additionally, fees for granting and maintaining the validity of these rights. In many countries, pursuant to the terms of international intellectual property agreements which in principle stipulate that the income from procedural fees for the granting and maintenance of such rights be used for the further development of the intellectual property protection system, this income is classified as the “proprietary revenue” of the competent intellectual property office. Such a practice also existed in Croatia from 1991, when the Office was established, until 2007, when the process of establishing the state treasury and the associated systematic regulation of revenue and expenditure in the central government budget led to a re-interpretation of the concept of “proprietary revenue” of government bodies. In other words, prior to 2007 the revenue from fees for intellectual property rights granting and maintenance procedures falling under the Office’s responsibility was remitted to a special sub-account of the government budget, from which the Office settled a part of its operating costs directly while unspent funds accumulated in the same sub-account and were visible in the prescribed financial reports of the Office.

That such operations were in conformity with the law is confirmed by an audit report from 2004 in which they were not called into question in any way whatsoever. However, according to the interpretation of the aforementioned budgetary inspection from 2008, the changes that had taken place in the meantime in relation to the definition of “proprietary revenue” of government bodies and in the context of the overall process of introducing a regulated government accounting system, resulted in a situation in which the Office’s revenue from fees for procedures for granting and maintaining the validity of intellectual property rights was henceforth to be considered as part of the general revenue of the central government budget. At this point it was requested that the funds which had hitherto been accumulated in the so-called “proprietary revenue” sub-account of the Office should be transferred into the central government budget account and that the planned expenditure from the central government budget for the operating costs of the Office be increased by a corresponding amount. The Office subsequently complied with this request. However, despite the detection of certain accounting irregularities in relation to the consistent management of expenditure between the so-called “proprietary revenue” sub-account and the central government budget account, the disputed budgetary inspection did not reveal any actual misuse of the financial resources.

The Office wishes to point out that the media reports concerning this matter and the allegations made by Ms Stilin systematically omit to mention that all detected irregularities were subsequently resolved and clarified, and that the competent authorities which had the disputed budgetary inspection report at their disposal evidently did not consider the established irregularities to merit further investigation. In every detailed audit of the operations of any legal entity a certain number of irregularities are almost always detected and the competent authorities subsequently undertake corrective measures depending on the objective gravity of the detected irregularities. It is emphasised that 8 identical copies of the disputed budgetary inspection report were compiled and submitted to the competent authorities in accordance with the applicable regulations on budgetary inspection.

The Office also wishes to draw attention to the misrepresentation concerning a “multi-million amount of fees” which the Director General allegedly paid out to himself and his “cronies”. The sum referred to corresponds to approximately 10% of the total amount that was paid out for the regular services of the Office employees over the same period, and it relates to payments made on various grounds to 42 of a total of 104 employees of the Office, including several months of full-time contract employment for a few individuals. It has also been omitted to explain that the only fee which was paid out to Mr Topić was for professional services on the examination committee for certified representatives in proceedings conducted by the Office and which was transparently and legally regulated and paid out in the same manner to all members of the examination committee. With regard to allegations about the fees for the committee members not being fully covered by the examination fees paid by applicants, we would like to point out that prior to the Decision of the Government of the Republic of Croatia in 2011 abolishing compensation due to civil servants for membership of expert committees, such fees paid to civil servants for services provided to expert committees in numerous state administration bodies were paid in full from the central government budget account, and that subsequent to the disputed budgetary inspection the Office aligned the examination fees with the level of compensation due to the examination board. The Office would also like to emphasise that in accordance with the results of the Feasibility Study on the Restructuring of the Office into a Self-Financing Organisation, which was carried out by independent experts, it was determined that the central government budget revenues arising from fees for the granting and maintenance procedures for intellectual property rights which were a direct result of the operations of the Office in 2007 and 2008 exceeded the total operating expenditure of the Office by approximately 800,000 HRK.

Concerning the fabricated “affair” about the allegedly illegal procurement of an official Mercedes vehicle and its “concealment” in the Office archives, all unfounded allegations based on malicious anonymous submissions by staff members were publicly refuted by the Office with counter-arguments immediately after their initial publication in 2009, a detail which the media now writing about this matter systematically omits to mention. They also fail to refer to a clear and unambiguous statement in the report of an administrative inspection conducted by the Ministry of Science, Education and Sports according to which it was established that there had been no irregularities in the procurement and usage of official vehicles at the Office.

With regard to the aforementioned criminal charges filed against the Director General of the Office, a key fact has been omitted: criminal charges can be filed by anyone, regardless of the merits of the case and the competent authorities are obliged to start investigative proceedings in relation to any criminal charges filed, no matter how unfounded they may prove to be after the investigation has been carried out. With regard to the specific criminal charges referred to here, the Office wishes to draw particular attention to the following facts.

The criminal charges brought by the employee Zdenko Haluza for the alleged forgery of an official document by Mr Topić are based on the date of entry into force of the Regulations on the Internal Organisation of the Office, which was incorrectly stated in the Decision concerning the transfer of Mr Haluza from an abolished position to a new position at the same level of competence and with identical associated rights. Mr Haluza has been trying to challenge the aforementioned transfer without success since 2008 and he refuses to carry out the duties associated with the new position to which he was transferred. After the legality of this transfer and the irrelevance in this regard of the incorrectly stated date were confirmed, Mr Haluza had exhausted the available means of redress in his proceedings against the Decision of the Office and he therefore resorted to the malicious filing of a criminal lawsuit for the forgery of an official document as the only remaining way of challenging the transfer. In the meantime, this lawsuit has been dismissed by the State Attorney’s Office. However, under the Croatian Criminal Code, a plaintiff can pursue the proceedings as a private plaintiff after the claim has been dismissed by the State Attorney’s Office, which is what Mr Haluza has done. In view of the evident absurdity of the criminal charges, it is more than certain that the outcome of the aforementioned proceedings will be in Mr Topić’s favour.

The second criminal charge against Mr Topić “by the employees of the Office” is the one filed by Ms Stilin as a private plaintiff which relates to the allegedly defamatory content of one of several proposals made by Mr Topić to relieve Ms Stilin of her duties as an Assistant Director. The alleged libel relates to a memorandum explaining the unsatisfactory performance of the duties of Assistant Director on the part of Ms Stilin due to which her dismissal from these duties was proposed. The media articles have systematically omitted mention of the fact, which Ms Stilin has confirmed in her public statements, that in the court proceedings in this criminal case Mr Topić has already been acquitted twice on the basis of two non-binding decisions, [i.e. first instance decisions that are not finally binding]. Based on previous experience it is certain that Ms Stilin will continue these proceedings until she has exhausted all available legal means, and thereafter by using other forms of pressure.

The third criminal charge is the one filed by Mr Frgačić in the so-called “Lufthansa-Affair”. The Office emphasises that it conducts more than 10,000 procedures a year in connection with requests to grant intellectual property rights, a significant part of which are terminated by a decision not to grant the requested right because the prescribed requirements have not been met. There thus exists the inherent possibility that an applicant will be dissatisfied with the decision of the Office no matter how well supported by arguments and based on law it was. The character of the dissatisfied party will determine which legal remedies they rely on to pursue their interests and this does not exclude filing arbitrary criminal charges and making accusations about the alleged corruption of officials.

It is also known to the Office that the obligatory investigative actions are being conducted as prescribed in relation to criminal charges the content of which makes it evident that they are based on malicious accusations originating from the habitual arsenal employed by Ms Stilin in the daily submissions with which she exerts pressure on the government and judicial authorities.

With regard to the so-called ZAMP-Affair (Protection of Music Copyright), the Office has already issued a press release and on this occasion emphasises once again that all allegations of irregularities concerning the collective management of these rights are completely unfounded and that this has been recognised in the meantime by a good part of the objectively-minded public.

From the fact that Mr Topić is portrayed by the media in turns either as a confidant of President Josipović or as “Sanader’s apparatchik”, the absurdity of all speculation about his appointment as Director General being due to some kind of political patronage becomes apparent.

Apart from a year-long break when he worked in the private sector, Mr Topic held various professional and managerial functions in the Office more or less from the time of its establishment until he left the position of Director General to take up his appointment as Vice-President of the European Patent Office. It is evident from this that he was appointed as Director General based solely on professional rather than political considerations. The only person who has invoked party membership in an attempt to secure her own interests has been Ms Stilin who in her numerous absurd accusations against Mr Topić stated inter alia that her dismissal was a consequence of his discrimination against her because of her membership of HDZ.

Mr Topić’s selection as a Vice-President of the European Patent Office has also been the subject of outrageous misrepresentation by the media. The aforementioned position is awarded solely on merit and it is not a political appointment. Moreover, Mr Topić obtained the position on the basis of a publicly advertised competition for which he applied along with three other candidates. Mr Topić was chosen following the presentation of his candidacy to the Administrative Council of the European Patent Organisation, of which the European Patent Office is the executive organ, and after he had received the votes of a majority of the representatives of the 38 member states during the first round of secret voting on the four candidates, and it was not due to any kind of political lobbying by Croatian diplomacy.

In conclusion, the Office wishes to express its grave concern about the fact that such extremely unprofessional media manipulation based on malicious accusations from a small number of people obviously driven by questionable motives can cause the reputation of a state institution and its Director to be called into question in such an outrageous manner, despite the notable results achieved by the Office and its professional reputation in the relevant national and international professional circles, which is incontrovertibly confirmed by the official reports of the European Commission, the international awards presented to Mr Topić and his appointment to a high executive function at the European Patent Office based inter alia upon the results achieved during his many years as the head of the Office. We particularly regret that the competent institutions have also succumbed to this unprecedented pressure and have subordinated their actions to individual interests rather than objective reasoning based on relevant facts.

This so-called ‘press release’ reads like an ad hominem blog post, throwing accusations mostly at Ms Stilin. Sadly enough for Topić, his lost as SLAPP case and Stilin not only won but Topić is liable to pay all her legal fees. The judge basically smashed Topić’s narrative to pieces. The EPO’s ringleader, Battistelli, probably hopes that his staff will never find out about that. Battistelli relied on this case when supposedly ‘dispelling’ ‘rumours’. But we have English and German translations of this recent ruling.

“Just for information,” added our source, “the Croatian media have claimed that Topić authored that press release himself (i.e. the original Croatian version) and ordered it to be published on the official website of the SIPO.”

That’s in itself a serious indication of Topić’s crooked mind.

Refer to the translation in PLR-EN — an article published by dnevno.hr in April of 2013. Here is the full translation of the text passed to us:

DISCLAIMER: The text which follows is a translation from the original Croatian. The accuracy of the translation is not guaranteed. The original article can be found at: http://www.dnevno.hr/vijesti/hrvatska/85582-bivsi-ravnatelj-dziv-a-zeljko-topic-zakinuo-jehrvatske-knjizevnike-za-milijune-kuna.html

Croatian writers claim that former DZIV Director Željko Topić cheated them out of millions of Kuna

Written by: Mladen Prenc
Sunday, 28 April 2013

“For the common good and in order to provide complete information to both the Croatian and international public, we have decided to speak out on the subject of the threatened existence of Croatian writers, and also journalists, publishers, illustrators and other related professions. Starting in 2007, writers were supposed to receive financial compensation from the state for the lending of their books in public libraries based on the so-called Public Lending Right, but to date they have not received a single cent”.

This appeal has been issued by anonymous sources from the Croatian Writers’ Association* [Društvo hrvatskih književnika / DHK] who have contacted the news portal Dnevno. After remaining silent for a number of years, the writers have finally decided to speak out about the alleged injustice done to them, and for which they blame the former long-time director of the State Intellectual Property Office (DZIV), Željko Topić, who now holds the position of Vice-President of the European Patent Office (EPO) in Munich. The writers ask the following question: Why didn’t the Copyright Act in Croatia become operational for writers and other artists in the same way as it did for musicians (within the framework of the Protection of Music Copyrights – ZAMP)?

Instead of including writers, only members of ZAMP were protected

They claim that the DZIV was appointed to act on behalf of the State as the coordinating body for the implementation of the above-mentioned Public Lending Right (PLR) based on the National Strategy for the Development of the Intellectual Ownership System in the period from 2005 to 2010. This Strategy was developed by DZIV itself, and the year 2007 was established as the deadline for PLR implementation. At the 4th European Public Lending Right Conference held in Budapest in April 2007, a proposal was made to hold the next European Conference in Croatia in order to provide writers in our country with support in relation to the implementation of the new right, which had already been introduced into Croatian legislation in 2003 by means of the Copyright and Related Rights Act which was based on the EU Directive 92/100/EEC.

The writers explain how Željko Topić continued to ignore all of the initiatives associated with the organisation of the European Public Lending Right Conference in Croatia for over a year, before finally turning down the request of the Conference organisers on 2 April 2008. His argument was that the Croatian state agency responsible for the matter, i.e. the DZIV, lacked the financial means to bear its share of the Conference costs – a ridiculously small sum of 100,000 HRK, or approximately 15,000 EUR. The balance was to be provided by the Conference organisers. However, the story of the DZIV’s empty coffers, which Topić used as a convenient excuse, is contradicted by the official remuneration disbursement schedule for the year 2007, which clearly shows that the DZIV had ample funds at its disposal. As evidence of this claim, we publish the 2007 disbursement schedule as an annex.

According to the schedule, additional remuneration was paid out to certain permanent employees of DZIV on top of their regular salary. It is interesting to note that this additional “contract work” appears to have been carried out by those employees during their normal working hours using the resources of the DZIV thereby effectively amounting to a form of illegal income. In any case, the former Director of the DZIV rejected the request of the Conference organisers because of an alleged lack of funds, while at the same time paying out generous additional remuneration to selected staff inside the DZIV. At this point it is necessary to emphasise that the aforementioned schedule does not include payments to external collaborators, travel expenses or other financial gems of the notorious crew resident at Vukovarska 78 in Zagreb [i.e. the DZIV]. Moreover, our sources from the Croatian Writers’ Association claim that in
parallel to the DZIV’s obstruction in the case of the Public Lending Right for authors, the development and monitoring of rights protection for certain other forms of copyright, in particular those relating to ZAMP [i.e. musical royalties], were receiving a completely different and privileged level of support from this state agency.

The DZIV Vehicle Fleet

Apart from generous additional remuneration for himself and certain favoured employees of the DZIV, the information available to us indicates that Željko Topić was also capable of financing the cost of six official DZIV vehicles: three older ones – an Audi 6, an Audi 4 and a Skoda – as well as three completely new ones – a Mercedes, an Audi 6 and a Skoda. The new Audi 6 was for the then Minister of Science Dragan Primorac, who was responsible for the DZIV at the time; the new Mercedes, i.e. “Merc” and the older Audi 6 for Topić himself, the older Audi A4 for his deputy Romana Matanovac, and the new Skoda for the assistant Director Ljiljana Kuterovac. All of this was in addition to the documented amount of 1,033,182.28 HRK, clearly visible in the schedule annexed to this article, which was paid out as additional remuneration for the year 2007 (on top of the regular salary) to around half of the DZIV employees, with the “duo” consisting of Željko Topić and Romana Matanovac topping the list of beneficiaries. In a Budgetary Audit Report relating to the DZIV dated 15 January 2008 and carried out by the Ministry of Finance, this amount is listed as improper expenditure in contravention of the Labour Act, the Collective Agreement for Civil Servants and Employees and the Budget Act. The aforementioned Report notes that Topić’s actions in this respect constitute an offence subject to sanction by a fine in the amount up to 100,000 HRK pursuant to the Budget Act. Notwithstanding a legal obligation to do so, for reasons known only to themselves neither the inspectors from the Ministry of Finance nor the Minister with responsibility for the DZIV at that time, Dragan Primorac, saw fit to initiate civil or criminal proceedings against Topić.

Are Croatian writers finally about to take action against the former DZIV director Željko Topić by way of a collective lawsuit or by alternative legal means, in an effort to call him to account for causing them significant financial damage by abusing his position and authority and neglecting his official duty to facilitate the implementation of the new Public Lending Right? Thanks to him they have still not received a single cent of financial compensation which is of existential importance for writers and for other related professions as mentioned above. To what extent Mr Topić and the socalled “clique of intellectuals” at the DZIV have forearmed themselves against the eventuality of legal action on the part of Croatian writers has yet to be ascertained.

Official or private website?

We would also like to remind our readers that Željko Topić made use of the official DZIV website last year to settle accounts with persons who had pressed criminal charges against him as well as with the media outlets that had drawn the attention of the public to his violations of the law. Although he had moved to Munich in the meantime after voluntarily handing in his notice at the DZIV to take up the position of Vice-President of the EPO in the Bavarian capital, in April 2012 he suddenly returned to Zagreb on the last day of the month. As the working day was drawing to a close he ordered a surprised employee of the DZIV IT department to publish a controversial exculpatory “press release” on the official DZIV website^*. In other words, having no possibility to obtain publication of such a self-serving statement in the press or on the Internet portals that had reported piquant details about him, he abused his position and influence inasmuch as he effectively requisitioned the website of a state agency for a private purpose, i.e. to publish a rejoinder in his own defence.

In addition to that, as part of his efforts to discredit the published articles disclosing the illegal actions carried out during his time at the DZIV, Topić filed a complaint with the Croatian Journalists’ Association, accusing the journalists who had written the articles of violating the journalistic code of honour by publishing unverified and defamatory information about him. The Press Council of the Croatian Journalists’ Association rejected Topić’s accusations and published its reasoned findings on its official website ^**.

Whether by coincidence or not, the Croatian law firms that represent Željko Topić in the criminal proceedings pending against him were at the same time also representing those who had indicted him – at least until such time as this was inadvertently revealed. In this way, they had access to privileged information concerning the other party. The lawyers who represent Mr Topić in criminal legal matters in Croatian courts are the law firm Silvije Hraste and the law firm Gajski-Prka-Saucha and Partners d.o.o. Affidavits bearing stamps of these law firms have been deposited in all criminal cases concerning Željko Topić. Our editors are in possession of copies of these documents.

Finally, it should be pointed out that the aforementioned law firms are at the same time officially registered as the legal representatives of the DZIV in Zagreb. In this way the circle is closed.

Contentious appointment and DZIV audit

In the course of conducting an audit of the DZIV and its then Director Željko Topić in 2012, the Ministry of Science under the control of Minister Željko Jovanović omitted to analyse a key document of the Croatian Government from which it plainly follows that Romana Matanovac, who was at the time employed by the state agency DZIV, was ineligible to be appointed as a member of the Board of Experts for Copyright and Related Rights [due to a conflict of interest].

Matanovac’s transgressions include approving the payment of some 300,000 HRK by the DZIV in 2008 for the ALAI Congress [held in Dubrovnik], under the stewardship of Professor Igor Gliha otherwise known as a close friend of Ivo Josipović, the Croatian President, instead of providing funds for the Public Lending Right Conference, despite the fact that the DZIV had a whole year to prepare for the latter event and was under an official obligation to organise it. Out of approximately 110 permanent employees of the DZIV, the only ones who appear to have benefitted from the exclusive privilege of receiving multiple additional perks were Romana Matanovac and Ljiljana Kuterovac both of whom evidently enjoyed the special confidence of the former Director Topić.

In conclusion we note that Croatian writers are still searching for answers to a number of unsolved riddles. For example, why did Ms. Romana Matanovac not adopt the same professional approach to the implementation of the Personal Lending Right as she did in the case of Josipović’s ZAMP [i.e. music royalties]? And what exactly is it that makes Croatian musicians worth more than writers?

_______________________________________________
^* The press release referred to is available on the DZIV website (in Croatian only):
http://www.dziv.hr/files/File/novosti/Priopcenje_za_javnost_30042012.pdf
^** The findings of the Croatian Press Council in the case of Željko Topić vs. Slavica Lukić may be accessed here (in Croatian only):
http://www.hnd.hr/hr/Zakljucci7sjednice2012/show/66192/

The writers explain how Topić continued to ignore all of the initiatives associated with the organisation of the European Public Lending Right Conference in Croatia for over a year, before finally turning down the request of the Conference organisers on 2 April 2008. His excuse was that the DZIV lacked the financial means to bear its share of the Conference costs. However, at the same time Topić was paying himself and certain favoured DZIV employees generous amounts of “additional remuneration” as evidenced by the official disbursement schedule.

Readers, including those outside of Croatia, are advised to read the above text, especially the parts about bribery using vehicles, intimidation by Topić using SLAPP litigation, and apparent misuse of his position in SIPO. It’s quite revealing and we are increasingly convinced that Topić knows damn well that he has done so much wrong, hence he is trying to silence those who speak out, even if this involves years in courts and much in lawyers’ fees (for both sides). Topić knows the abusive arts of litigation. It’s his field. It’s what he’s best at, based on his track record.

We asked a source if Topić is indeed likely to have turned SIPO into his blogging platform (sort of). “This sounds plausible to,” told us this source, “because, according to official government records, [it appeared] following his appointment to the EPO Topić’s term of office as Director-General of the SIPO expired on 30 April 2012 (i.e. the date of the “Press Release”). So according to official records, he was still the Director-General of the SIPO when the “Press Release” was published.”

In the coming days we are going to cover the sham ‘investigation’ from Benoît Battistelli and his cronies. They are not interested in finding out the truth about Topić, only in defending him (so as to cover their own behinds). █

Summary: The legal loss of Željko Topić laid bear for the public to see even outside Croatia

THE DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY we learned that Željko Topić had lost his case in his home country, Croatia (where he is facing many criminal charges). Surely he hopes that nobody outside Croatia will find out, let alone have access to the text in a language like French, German, or English. But thanks to our sources we now have precisely that. It’s a ruling from Judge Bertalanič (pictured above).

Here is the relevant (original) document [PDF], which is a summary judgement (in Croatian). As promised a couple of days ago we now have this recent judgment of the Municipal Criminal Court of Zagreb relating to the defamation complaint which Mr. Topić filed against Ms. Vesna Stilin (classic gag attempt in our humble assessment because that would be a classic manoeuvre where one sues the messenger to intimidate and create an illusion of equality).

“The full judgement,” says our source, “including a detailed statement of the grounds is expected to become available in February.

“The summary judgment basically states that the accused (i.e. Ms. Stilin) has been “acquitted of the charges” ["OSLOBADJA SE OPTUZBE" in Croatian]. It then goes on to list the charges under items 1. and 2.

“The charges were based on the contents of two letters sent in 2010 by Ms. Stilin to the then Croatian Prime Minister Jadranka Kosor (with copies to various Ministries).

“The paragraphs in italics are passages from the letters which were alleged to be defamatory.

“Of particular interest is the accusation that Mr. Topić literally “purchased” his second term of office in 2008 by providing an Audi to the Minister at an estimated cost of 500.000 HRK (ca. EUR 66.000).”

Here is the relevant part:

“Topić Željko kupio je svoj drugi mandat ravnatelja DZIV-a, plativši cca 500.000,00 kuna MZOŠ u razdoblju od preko 2 godine (od svibnja 2007., kada je potpisan navedeni Ugovor, do srpnja 2009., kada je Primorac otišao iz Ministarstva), što spominjem, uz ostalo i u Ustavnoj tužbi br.: U-III 5023/08 koja je još u rješavanju, gdje osporavam Topićevo imenovanje za ravnatelja… …..Naime, podnijela sam kandidaturu za ravnateljicu Zavoda nakon što je isti krajem 2007. potajno… ukinuo moj sector …”

“The court found that the assertions which Ms. Stilin made about Mr. Topić were not defamatory,” said our source for this. “The summary judgment concludes by stating that the plaintiff (i.e. Mr. Topić) is to bear all costs.

“It would be interesting to know whether EPO funds are going to be used for this purpose.”

This last remark alludes to the fact that when Topić travels to Croatia to face justice he labels it business trips or something along those lines. The last thing he wants is informed colleagues who know where he is coming from. Sooner or later we might see this man in prison, not just outside the top floors of the EPO. Battistelli has got quite a liability in his hands. █

SEVERAL days ago we highlighted Željko Topić’s skeletons (in his closet), noting that Vesna Stilin, whom we mentioned in several older articles of ours (she is one of Topić’s victims), was trying to bring light to Topić’s past. In the future we intend to show more of the history of Stilin’s fights and arguments with Topić, but today we would like to focus on her call to retract a retraction.

This Croatian “request for rectification” has been submitted to the Croatian Web site 45lines.com, which is operated by Zeljko Peratovic. After Peratovic had written an expose about Topić it mysteriously got taken down, under circumstances that we explained on Sunday. Our guess is that Peratovic is unlikely to publish his article once again, at least based on our supposition that he was scared into removing it voluntarily.

Our readers sent us an English translation of Stilin’s letter to 45lines.com and it goes as follows:

Submitted by: Vesna Stilin LL.B

Subject: Request for rectification of published information

I refer to the article on the website 45lines.com titled “A wrong man sitting in EPO? – Apology to Željko Topić: Regarding the deleted article regarding EPO”, which was published in Croatian on 16 December 2014 and in English on 19 December 2014 on the aforementioned portal, and which contains some incorrect and incomplete information:

http://45lines.com/isprika-zeljku-topicu-osvrt-na-obrisani-tekst-o-epo-u/

http://en.45lines.com/apology-zeljko-topic-regarding-deleted-article-regarding-epo/

For the purpose of providing the public with objective and complete information, and in accordance with the provisions of the Article 40 of the Croatian Media Act (Official Gazette
59/04), I hereby kindly request you to publish the following rectification.

Motivated by the “Apology” of the journalist Željko Peratović to Željko Topić, former Director of the State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO), I would like to point out the following concerning the text of said “Apology” the accuracy of which is disputed:

The author of the “Apology”, Mr. Peratović, omits to mention the names of the three independent sources who, according to his claims, deceived him when he wrote the article “A wrong man
sitting in EPO” and which moved him to delete the original article and to apologize to Željko Topić by publishing a new article (i.e. the disputed “Apology”). Nevertheless, I consider that the following statement made by Mr. Peratovic in the disputed “Apology” implicitly refers to me:

“I have also wrote [sic] that it is a big corruption affair which grew outside the Croatian borders and that many criminal complaints have been filed and lawsuits led against him in Croatia. Now it is clear that all the criminal complaints that were initiated against Željko Topić are coming from the same source and that the only lawsuit is led for alleged slander. That lawsuit was completely refuted in court and he was completely acquitted of any responsibility.”

[Source: http://en.45lines.com/apology-zeljko-topic-regarding-deleted-article-regarding-epo/]

The above claim has been persistently and repeatedly made by Željko Topić, but it is untrue. In the disputed “Apology” Mr. Peratović restates this false claim in an apparent attempt to lend
credibility to it.

I am aware that, apart from myself, a number of other persons both from inside and from outside the SIPO have brought criminal charges and/or initiated civil proceedings against Željko Topić. With regard to matters concerning Željko Topić and myself, two private lawsuits are pending (in the first case I am the plaintiff, whereas in second case Mr. Topić is the plaintiff evidently encouraged by the lack of official oversight of the SIPO). With regard to the first private lawsuit which is the one referred to by Mr. Peratović in his “Apology”, following 6 court judgments (as a consequence of repeated remittals to the court of first instance following appeal) and what I consider to have been perjury on the part of Željko Topić’s deputy, the matter is now awaiting resolution before the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Croatia. With regard to the second private lawsuit in which Željko Topić is the plaintiff, I expect the first instance judgment to be delivered by the end of this month (i.e. January 2015).

In addition, I have filed a criminal complaint against Željko Topić in connection with a number of allegedly criminal actions which should be prosecuted ex officio. Following a request which I made in December 2014 to expedite the proceedings, I received a response from the District Public Prosecutor in Zagreb which, in essence, states the following:

“In the criminal case in question ….. we inform you that the complicated process of checking your allegations, as well as allegations from other sources, is in progress in order to determine whether the actions of Željko Topić, in his capacity as the Director of the State Intellectual Property Office and the actions of other responsible persons in that Office or other government bodies comprise the essential features of criminal offences subject to public prosecution.”

“I intend to submit evidence to Mr. Peratović regarding the above statements and expect him to do his job as investigative journalist. I am confident that afterwards he will have to issue a further apology, but this time it will not be to Željko Topić.”In his professional capacity as an investigative journalist, it would be useful for Mr. Peratović to find out what “other criminal proceedings” (as indicated in the Minutes of the Municipal Criminal Court in Zagreb – hereinafter MCC – from 4/5/2010, under No. K-163/09, in the Judgment of 31/5/2010 MCC, under no. K-163/09, and in the Judgment of 23/5/2011 MCC, under no. 34 K-238/10) were in progress against Željko Topić prior to his re-appointment as SIPO Director in early 2012 by the current Prime Minister Zoran Milanović, particularly in view of the fact that the competent supervisory Ministry of Science, Education and Sports does not appear to have reacted in spite of the warnings which it received. At the same time, there is an open question as to whether the Prime Minister Milanović was aware of the fact that the wife of his chef-de-cabinet Tomislav Saucha, i.e. Ms. Ivana Saucha, is a partner in the law firm which represents Željko Topić in court proceedings, and whether these circumstances might have had any influence on the Prime Minister’s decision to re-appoint Mr. Topić as the Director of the SIPO. Another question to be asked is why Mr. Topić reacted by filing a private lawsuit against me in April 2013, claiming inter alia that the Minutes of the MCC erroneously stated that he was “subject to a second criminal proceedings” given that he failed to react to this three years earlier when said allegation was noted in the Minutes of the MCC (4/5/2010) and in the aforementioned court Judgments (31/5/2010 and 23/5/2011). I note that the lawsuit which Mr. Topić filed against me in April 2013 has been decided in my favor in the meantime by both first and second instance courts.

I understand that the original documents reproduced along with the deleted article “A wrong man sitting in EPO?” are in the possession of a former Director of the SIPO, Mr. Hrvoje Junašević, and an official who worked as a representative at the SIPO, and that the aforementioned persons are willing to provide any explanation which may be required concerning the published documents.

I intend to submit evidence to Mr. Peratović regarding the above statements and expect him to do his job as investigative journalist. I am confident that afterwards he will have to issue a further apology, but this time it will not be to Željko Topić.

Pursuant to Article 41 of the Media Act, it is requested that this rectification be published in the same font size as the text and title and in the same section as the article to which it relates and that the rectification be linked to said article by a highlighted link.

VESNA STILIN LL.B

Date: 19 January 2015

This is not the end of it because we have just learned about a resignation, potentially resulting from some of these ugly affairs. We will write about it later this week. █

Summary: The nerve of Microsoft wasting taxpayers’ money in addition to evading tax, costing many billions of dollars to the US economy and countless billions outside the US while bullying regulators who dare to investigate the matter

ONE of Microsoft‘s very many abuses is avoidance of tax, not only in the US but also in Europe, Asia, and so on. The company hardly has a track record of obeying the law, so why make an exception when it comes to taxes?

“Microsoft continues to thrive in and promote lawlessness.”Microsoft really showed how arrogant it is when it attacked the IRS for merely investigating Microsoft (i.e. doing its job). It’s unprecedented bullying that one can expect from no company other than Microsoft because Microsoft has a past of criminal tax violations. It bribed people to make the charges go away and eventually settled with the investigators. Even Microsoft whistleblowers get bribed by Microsoft. Rich companies can get away with just about everything, provided they have government connections and enough money to bribe with.

Based on this new report, Microsoft is already abusing the IRS to the point where the IRS needs to spend millions of dollars on lawyers:

The software behemoth is battling the agency over whether it pushed profits offshore to skirt taxes. It’s the latest case to test IRS firepower in cracking down on similar tax maneuvers by other technology companies, which can save hundreds of millions using the tactics.

Both are playing hardball: The IRS, which is spending $2 million on outside legal guns to fight the case, also issued a summons to compel former CEO Steve Ballmer to testify, while Microsoft shot back with legal demands of its own, accusing the agency of hitting it with a “fusillade.”

The legal fees paid by the IRS are basically derived from tax budget. The bills are passed to the very same taxpayers which Microsoft deprived; so by attacking the enforcer over tax violations (over its own crimes) Microsoft basically wasted yet more tax money. How insidious is that? In Spain, a banker sued the judge who punished him for his crimes. This is even worse because the public pays the legal bills. Microsoft continues to thrive in and promote lawlessness. █

Summary: China is reportedly taking action against Microsoft’s notorious habit of tax evasion and fining the company well over $100 million

NOW THAT Microsoft has been found to be evading tax (a crime, but not one that executives of large corporations often go to jail for) and fined for it in a nation as large as China (just like in India half a decade ago, as well as in other places) is the US going to follow suit? Last week we showed that the IRS was on this case, so Microsoft began bullying the IRS (the vanity of corporations that control their government).

“”Remember when Microsoft China offices were raided (just earlier this year on numerous occasions and its patent extortion plot was targeted by the Chinese authorities? Well, it sure seems like China enforcing the law against massive criminals like Microsoft, setting a good precedent that US and Europe should follow. To quote the new report: “Microsoft has reportedly been issued with a charge for £87 million in back-taxes following an investigation into alleged tax evasion by the Chinese authorities.”

For those who still associate Microsoft with something other than crime and corruption, the news report above can serve as a valuable wake-up call. █