"As a service provider in domain names, CNNIC is not authorized to identify famous brands and should treat applicants equally," said Liu Haiqi, a judge with the court.

Liu made the remarks after the Beijing Zhengpu Science Development Company lost the case against CNNIC and Alibaba, a well-known Internet-based business-to-business company.

According to the judge, it was inappropriate for CNNIC to refuse the Beijing Zhengpu's application for the Chinese domain name "Alibaba" in January, last year.

However, while the Chinese domain name "Alibaba" has been registered by the Alibaba company, the legal rights of this famous website would be violated if the Chinese name "Alibaba" was given back to the Zhengpu Company, according to Liu.

"This is a strange verdict," claimed Shi Yusheng, a lawyer for the Zhengpu Company.

"On the one hand, the court confirmed the validity of our appeal, but it still overruled it," said Shi.

The court's decision also confirmed the necessity to adopt this measure for names of administrative divisions, governmental organizations and educational organizations to guarantee Internet order.

After releasing a temporary management method on Chinese domain names early last year, CNNIC has reserved a large number of Chinese domain names in advance.

Representatives from CNNIC refused to make any comment on the decision yesterday.

An earlier statement by the Alibaba company said it owns the serial rights of Alibaba and its Chinese translation.

(China Daily December 11, 2001)