China's highest court says it will get tougher on infringement of intellectual property rights (IPR), lowering the bar for treating the violations as crimes and ensuring that punishment be an effective deterrent.

Rules clarifying the criteria for punishing IPR violations come into effect Wednesday.

People found selling more than 5,000 copies of pirated video tapes could receive a minimum sentence of three years and a maximum of seven years in prison, the court said in a re-interpretation of the existing laws. Definitions of IPR violations were also firmed up to make it easier to prosecute offenders.

The rules specify that sales of commodities worth more than 50,000 yuan (US$6,000) bearing counterfeit registered trademarks will be categorized as selling "relatively large" sales of such goods, and those involved could face imprisonment of up to three years, according to Cao Jianming, vice president of the Supreme People's Court.

Statistics from the Ministry of Public Security show that between 2002 and 2003 police solved more than 2,000 IPR-related crimes, involving about 1 billion yuan.

During the first half of this year, more than 500 cases were put on record, involving 260 million yuan. 

(Shenzhen Daily December 22, 2004)