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. Foreign-invested non-banking financial institutions can apply to set up wholly owned or joint venture companies for car financing. Foreign non-life insurance firms can set up branches or joint venture companies, in which they can hold up to 51 per cent. In telecommunications, foreign companies can now hold 30 per cent of companies providing value-added services, including Internet services and paging, in Shanghai, Guangzhou and Beijing. In construction, foreign companies can set up joint ventures in which they hold a majority share, and in tourism foreign firms can take a majority share in hotels leading to full ownership after four years.
