No requests to protect Belarusian brands in Customs Union yet

In line with the relevant agreement owners of trademarks can contact relevant patent bodies of Belarus, Russia, and Kazakhstan with a request to include them into the register. Belarus' Customs is unaware of such requests for now, said the official.

He said the national register of intellectual property objects contains 61 trademarks with only six trademarks owned by Belarusian manufacturers. The law allows owners of trademarks to get the trademarks included into the national register. If included, a trademark can be protected. Customs authorities would suspend processing and notify the owner of the trademark for the owner to resolve the dispute with the person that imports the disputed product, BelTA reports.

The official attributed the low number of manufacturers willing to protect their rights to the trademarks to the possibility that Belarusian companies see no need to protect their trademarks because export of such products from Belarus and import of such products to Belarus outside the Customs Union does no damage to the manufacturers.

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