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Protocol readers crash site

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On the day it joined the World Trade Organisation, China's foreign trade ministry published the full text of its protocol of accession, all 1,500 pages, on its Web site - but the site crashed for most of the day due to too many visitors.

A spokesman for the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Co-operation said its site, www.moftec.gov.cn, was overwhelmed by a flood of visitors yesterday.

After emergency repairs, the site was accessible in the late afternoon after being down for most of the day. However, the text was only in English, with the Chinese version, which the majority of people wanted to read, unavailable for a few more weeks.

The English version has been available on the WTO Web site since Beijing signed the protocol at a WTO ministerial meeting in Doha a month ago.

Some people were sceptical the full text would be released in Chinese because they believed the government was wary of upsetting the many domestic constituencies who were concerned about the negative results of entry.

The Web site contained details of China's commitments, such as banking and insurance, permission for foreign financial institutions in Shanghai and Shenzhen to conduct yuan business and those in Tianjin and Dalian to apply for it.

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