The costs of the procedures related to the recognition and exercise of industrial property rights have been es- tablished by ONAPI.
COPYRIGHTS The main objective of the Dominican copyright law is to provide a legal and institutional framework in accor- dance with the provisions of the Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights Agreement related to Commerce (TRIPS), which allows for the protection of copyrights in the Dominican Republic, taking into account the national interest. The National Copyright Office (ONDA) is the national authority in charge of ensuring the protection of copyrights and the application of the law. For these purposes, the law has granted ample administrative, supervision, and arbitration powers. Its supervision activities are enforced by the obligation of any importer or distributor of com- mercial goods, services, and equipment with author or related rights to register the same. Likewise, the country has ratified the following international conventions regarding this matter: • Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works from 1886; • Universal Copyright Convention from 1952; • Rome Convention for the Protection of Interpreters, Audio Producers, and Radio Transmission Orga- nizations from 1961; and,
• Treaties of the Intellectual Property World Organization (OMPI) for the Rights of Authors and Inter- preters and Phonograms of 1996.
Dominican copyright law protects all kind of original intellectual creations that may be fixed, transmitted, or re- produced by any existing means or are existing in print, reproduction, or dissemination. It also protects the in- dependent creations derived from original works, such as those resulting from the adaptation, translation, or in another manner transformed from its original version. It also protects and regulates the rights related to copyrights, in order to efficiently combat the illegal retrans- missions of television broadcasts and the unauthorized reproduction of musical productions, those which were two of the major gaps under the past legislation. Related rights are granted to artists for their interpretation, to the producers of phonograms for their recordings, and other radio transmitters (including the original transmis- sion by cable, fiber optics, or other method) for their radio and television programs. Finally, it protects the works of Dominican authors who reside in the country or who are nationals or reside in coun- tries that belong to international treaties ratified by the Dominican Republic, as well as works that are published for the first time in the country (or in a country signatory to an international treaty) or that have been published