Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun

China is not only the world's factory but is also becoming the world's innovation lab. The allegations of intellectual property theft by China are nothing but baseless narratives, said Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun on Wednesday.

Guo was responding to media inquiries about individual countries that continue to accuse China of infringing on IP rights and "stealing" cutting-edge technologies in critical sectors and have rolled out bans on China, despite witnessing breakthroughs in China's emerging areas, such as AI, quantum technology and crewed space programs

Guo said that China's development is the result of its own dedication and effort as well as international cooperation that delivers mutual benefits. China will stay committed to the vision of building a community with a shared future for humanity and the principle of openness, inclusiveness, balance and benefits for all, boost IPR international cooperation and advance a fairer and more just global governance system on IP.

"To protect IP rights is to protect innovation and enable high-quality development," Guo said.

April 26 marks the World Intellectual Property (IP) Day and China's National IP Publicity Week is being launched starting from Monday. According to the spokesperson, China is one of the world's leading countries in the area of IP and has been the top filer of international patent applications for years. China is committed to protecting intellectual property rights (IPR). "We've established 81 national-level IPR protection centers, 50 fast IPR protection service centers and 99 overseas IPR dispute response guidance platforms, providing more satisfying IPR protection services for the society."

More and more transnational corporations have set up their R&D centers in China and the number of valid invention patents applied in China has increased year by year, said Guo.

Global Times