GUANGZHOU: A leading French law firm has opened an office in Guangzhou in response to increasing demand for French legal information.

Paris-based DS Avocats, one of the top 20 law firms in France with more than 200 attorneys around the world, inaugurated its Guangzhou office last week.

It is the company's third office in China after Beijing and Shanghai.

"Our client base has undergone a dramatic change in the past two decades," Daniel Chausse, president of DS Avocats, told China Daily.

In the 1980s, all of DS Avocats' clients in China were influential French companies, most engaged in big engineering projects in China.

"Today, 20 percent of our clients are Chinese businessmen.

"More and more Chinese companies are entering the French market increasing demand for French legal information," Chausse said.

Guangzhou is a center for manufacturing and trade. More and more businessmen from the Pearl River Delta are thinking about doing business with France.

Before leaving China, they need plenty of legal information about foreigners doing business in France, said Calude Le Gaonach-Bret, a partner of the law firm who has been in Beijing for more than 30 years.

DS Avocats has a large number of clients in the Pearl River Delta.

It intended to get into the Guangdong market a long time ago. However, according to Chinese law, a foreign law firm cannot open a new office until its original one has been in operation for more than three years.

Unlike in other countries, foreign attorneys cannot practice law in Chinese courts.

"I hope foreign lawyers will be eligible to get attorney certificates in China, so that they can appear in court. Moreover, we hope we can set up independent law firms in China, but not legal offices that are affiliated with our French headquarters," Chausse said.

(China Daily 07/03/2007 page5)