China expresses doubts over credibility, objectivity of U.S. report on fake goods

BEIJING (Reuters) - China's commerce ministry expressed doubts on Thursday over the credibility and objectivity of the United States' annual blacklist of markets for sales of fake goods.

The U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) recently issued its annual list of the world's most "notorious markets" for sales of pirated and counterfeit goods.

The USTR has put Alibaba's Taobao on its blacklist for the second year in a row over suspected counterfeits sold on the shopping platform, a move the Chinese e-commerce giant said did not reflect its IP-protection efforts.

The report lacks solid evidence, Gao Feng, a spokesman of China's commerce ministry, told a briefing, adding that the Chinese government always attaches great importance to intellectual property protection.

(Reporting by Beijing Monitoring Desk; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman)