China’s commerce ministry has hit back at the US Trade Representative’s office (USTR) for putting Chinese companies alleged of dealing in counterfeit products on its “notorious markets” list, calling the move “unobjective” and “irresponsible.”
By adopting ambiguous wording in this year’s Review of Notorious Markets report, and by adding disclaimers, the report lacks fairness and objectivity, the Chinese Ministry of Commerce spokesman Shen Danyang said on Thursday in Beijing, according to a transcript on the ministry’s website.
“In the Notorious Report, the US used terms like ‘it is claimed that’ and ‘it has been reported that’ in the description of activities by Chinese companies,” he said. “The US also claimed the report was not equal to an investigation result or governmental analysis on countries’ intellectual property protection situation. This is irresponsible and unobjective.”
The Chinese trade ministry had confronted the USTR over its report, as the US office had doubled its period for soliciting public comments, Shen said.
“We hope the US can further raise the transparency of its processes, and adopt a fair, bona fide approach when assessing Chinese companies’ results and efforts on intellectual property protection,” Shen said.
Shen’s comment was in response to the announcement a week ago by US Trade Representative Michael Froman of the findings of the 2016 Special 301 Out-of-Cycle Review of Notorious Markets, which identified Taobao, BeeVideo, GongChang and Nanjing Imperiosus Technology as among the offenders.