China's market supervisors detected 428 violations of the Beijing Olympics logos last year, up 45 percent from 2005, according to the State Administration of Industry and Commerce (SAIC).

The administration would not disclose details, but one case involved two Beijing companies that fraudulently took application fees from firms wanting to be considered as the "most valuable brand names" by the organizing committee of the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Their scam has been listed among the top 10 "typical IPR violation cases" in 2006.

An SAIC statement said the 10 cases were selected from 192 trademark infringement cases referred to public security departments last year and involved well-known trademarks such as Nike, Adidas, Puma, Nokia, Sony Ericsson, Chivas, Regal, Martell, Hennessy, Lacoste and Philips.

The SAIC and its local branches had planned to target 69 Olympic logos under legal protection including "Fuwa", the official Mascots, the emblems for the Beijing 2008 Olympics and Paralympics Games, Beijng's Olympic slogan and the symbol of the Olympic torch relay.

From 2004 to 2006, the SAIC has dealt with 1,128 such infringement cases involving 14.89 million yuan (1.95 million U.S. dollars) and imposed 8.38 million yuan (1.16 million U.S. dollars) in fines.

The trademark logos are owned by the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Olympic Games (BOCOG), and only authorized companies are allowed to manufacture products bearing Olympic logos.

On June 1, Hong Kong Customs raided seven market stalls, seizing about 350 items bearing Olympic logos, including key rings, watches, caps, badges and stickers, worth about 7,000 HK dollars (897 U.S. dollars).

The BOCOG has warned that genuine products should have anti-counterfeiting labels and certificates of examination and be sold at licensed retail outlets.

The SAIC has dealt with 193,332 cases of trademark infringement, including 28,041 cases related to foreign trademarks, since the country's entry into World Trade Organization in 2001.

Source: Xinhua