Legal notes to copyright registration in Timor-Leste

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Copyright registration in Timor-Leste. Timor-Leste, also known as East Timor, officially the Democratic Republic of East Timor is a country in Southeast Asia. Before and during colonial times, Timor-Leste was most famous for sandalwood. The country has a large and potential coffee industry, which often sells coffee to many Fair Trade retailers and on the open market. Accordingly, many businesses want to enter this market and one of the most important preparations a business needs to take before expanding to this country is to learn the procedure of copyright registration in Timor-Leste.

Copyright in Timor-Leste

Unlike other intellectual property rights such as trademarks, patents, industrial designs, plant varieties, etc., copyright does not need to be registered for protection but will be automatically protected from the time the works are created.

The creation must be visible in a certain material form, like content, quality, form, medium, language, published or unpublished, registered or unregistered.

Accordingly, whether registered or not, the copyright to the work will still be protected. However, the creator should still apply for copyright registration in Timor-Leste early because early registration will give the author/owner of the work many advantages in the event of a dispute.

When unauthorized use of work occurs around the world, the owner of a work who has made a copyright registration in Timor-Leste will not have to waste time and complicate matters with proving himself/herself to be the legitimate owner of the work.

Thereby, in order to avoid passivity, the owner of the work should make a copyright registration in Timor-Leste immediately to protect their rights and interests when there is an infringement.

Copyright registration in Timor-Leste

At the moment, Timor-Leste is not a member country of The Berne Convention for Copyright.

The Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works (the Berne Convention) is an international agreement governing copyright. The agreement was first accepted in Berne, Switzerland, in 1886.

Documents for copyright registration in Timor-Leste

To obtain copyright registration in Timor-Leste, the author of the work needs to prepare the following documents:

  • Declaration of copyright registration in Timor-Leste;
  • Two copies of copyrighted work;
  • Documents proving the right to apply;
  • Written consent of co-authors, if the work has co-authors;
  • Written consent of the co-owners, if the copyright is jointly owned;
  • Notarized identity card of the author or owner of the work;
  • Power of Attorney, if the applicant is an authorized person;
  • Notarized copy of the company’s business registration certificate (if the owner is a company).

The copyright law of Timor-Leste

The official copyright law of Timor-Leste is expected to come into force in June, 2023 when it was approved in November 2022 (about 180 days or 6 months since its approval). This law also governs related rights. The law is called Code of Copyright and Related Rights intended to protect the creation, production and commercialization of literary, scientific and artistic works and their respective authors.

The Code contains 224 articles and is awaiting approval from the President of Timor-Leste.

Currently, Timor-Leste is observing the Universal Copyright Convention (UCC) for official ascension. This country hasn’t given information on other copyright related international treaties.

You can see a list of Timor-Leste IP firms here.

 

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