 Foreign pre-1973 works thus remained uncopyrighted in Russia, although they should have become subject to copyright according to article 18(2) of the Berne Convention because that article only exempted works that once "were" copyrighted, but on which that copyright already had expired, which didn't apply to pre-1973 foreign works in Russia.Russia faced severe criticism for this, especially from Western countries.The new article 5(4) of the Russian copyright law was supposed to resolve the situation by restoring copyright on such foreign works and making Russia's copyright law fully compliant with the Berne Convention.