The Pirate Kingdom

By PAT CHOATE

CHINA is the global epicenter of pirating and counterfeiting. By its government's own estimate, China's domestic trade in bogus goods accounts for $19 billion to $24 billion annually. That is undoubtedly a significant understatement, and it doesn't even include the stolen technologies and phony brands China exports to the rest of the world. Since welcoming China into the World Trade Organization in 2001, the United States has had a historic opportunity to stop the Chinese piracy trade. So far, the Bush administration has failed to seize it.

I opposed bringing China into the trade organization, and I don't like the idea of subordinating America's sovereignty to undemocratic international institutions like the W.T.O. But those decisions are behind us, and the worst thing we can do now is to fail to use the limited tools that the W.T.O. provides for protecting our economic interests.

>> Read the complete article