Court of Justice balances IP rights and international trade

The ECJ found that goods can be considered ‘counterfeit’ or ‘pirated’ where it is proved that they are intended to be put on sale in the EU, while goods coming from a non-member state which are imitations of goods protected in the EU by a trade mark, copyright, or design cannot be classified as ‘counterfeit’ or ‘pirated’ merely on the basis of the fact that they are brought into the EU under a suspensive procedure. The judgment is particularly interesting because the possibility for customs authorities to stop goods which are technically outside the EU territory was an unsettled and much debated issue.