Liu Xiang races to court win over photo
By Liu Li (China Daily)
Updated: 2005-12-16 06:04

Chinese Olympic 110-metre hurdles champion Liu Xiang has won his rights infringement case against Life Style newspaper after it digitally manipulated a photograph of him.

The Beijing No 1 Intermediate People's Court yesterday overturned an earlier verdict by Beijing Haidian District People's Court made in May, which had ruled against Liu's claim.

The intermediate court ordered Life Style to publish an apology within a month and pay Liu 20,000 yuan (US$2,500) damages.

Xu Fang, vice-president of the Life Style newspaper, told China Daily yesterday that they would appeal against the latest judgment to the Beijing High People's Court.

Yesterday's ruling said the newspaper's usage last October of Liu's picture jumping a hurdle on his way to winning a gold medal in the Athens Olympic Games damaged his personal dignity due to mistakes.

The photo took up most of the newspaper's front page in an issue last October. The bottom part of the page was an advertisement for a Beijing-based department store.

"Life Style made three major changes when using Liu's photo on the cover last October," Gao Ping, presiding judge of the case said.

A red flag was used as a background of the picture, replacing the original competition background. Meanwhile, the Olympic symbol on the hurdle and Nike trademark on Liu's clothing were deleted.

"The court concluded that Liu's picture on the cover of Life Style was related with advertisement of the Zhongyou Department Store," Gao said.

"The changes on Liu's picture misled the public to believe that Liu was advertising for the department store," she said.

The court believed that the newspaper violated the Advertising Law in using Liu's picture.

Advertisement must be distinguished clearly from other non-advertisement information and must not mislead consumers, according to the law.

The court did not support Liu's initial compensation claim of 1.25 million yuan (US$154,000), describing it as "too high."

Zheng Yinghua, a lawyer representing Liu, told China Daily yesterday that the judgment was acceptable although the compensation figure was not high enough.

Xu said his newspaper would also sue the China Athletic Association, claiming it had interfered with justice.

The association held a press conference shortly after Liu lost the first case in May, where it was said that the newspaper was unauthorized to conduct news reporting and advertising.

"We did normal news reporting in using Liu's photo. We need not ask his permission in doing this," Xu claimed.

(China Daily 12/16/2005 page3)