Brussels, 13/12/2010 (Agence Europe) - On Tuesday, the European Commission is due to unveil a proposal for “enhanced cooperation” to create an EU Patent. On Monday, the leader of the ALDE group, Guy Verhofstadt (former prime minister of Belgium) urged the Council to end the EU patent stalemate and reach an agreement rapidly (see EUROPE 10275): “The world will not stand still whilst member states delay a key element for enhanced competitiveness over a linguistic dispute. Europe's economy is flagging in comparison to the new, dynamic regions from Brazil to South Korea. We have no choice now but to support a proposal from the Commission to pursue a common EU patent on the basis of enhanced cooperation as unanimity seems impossible”. He explained that “Only with a simpler, streamlined patent regime can Europe really compete in the global marketplace”. “The arguments have been well rehearsed for many years now but the debate keeps going round in circles. A single EU patent regime will enable faster and cheaper patent applications for companies with innovative ideas and facilitate dispute settlement”, he added. “I hope that those countries which disagree with the approach will soon come on board and that rapid technological progress in automatic translation can address their concerns. Indeed, we may even witness an EU-patented machine translation service emerge as a result of progress on this subject”. (B.C. trans fl)