In Beijing on Wednesday the Memorandum on Strengthening the Cooperation of Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) Protection between China and Germany was inked.

According to the memorandum, China and Germany will push forward cooperation?in IPR protection and enhance the communications between the two countries in this field.

Jiang Zengwei, vice minister of commerce, and Hartmut Schauerte, parliamentary state secretary in the German Ministry of Economics and Technology, held talks at the Sino-German IPR protection workshop and came to the consensus that effective IPR protection was important to healthy bilateral economic and trade growth.

Hartmut Schauerte appreciated China's IPR protection efforts and the progress made. He hoped for further strengthening the IPR protection cooperation and? combating infringements.

Jiang said China was willing to cooperate with other countries on IPR protection which was essential for enhancing the country's innovation capability and realizing? comprehensive, harmonious and sustainable development.

(Xinhua News Agency April 27, 2006)