Asian legal jurisdictions have emerged as a key target of a European Commission-backed (EC) bid to liberalise legal services in upcoming World Trade Organisation (WTO) talks.

It emerged in March that the EC has placed legal services top of the list of issues to discuss in the latest round of talks under the WTO's General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), ahead of other industries such as accountancy and engineering.

Top of the list of countries the EC is lobbying for legal concessions under GATS is China, which is regarded as one of world's the most restrictive major legal markets. The EC is also pushing for the opening up of legal services in Japan and Korea.

The latest talks will begin in June when interested parties formally finalise their GATS agenda.

The key demand, which has put been forward by the Law Society of England and Wales to the EC, is that local Chinese lawyers should be able to give local advice within foreign firms.

Although China formally took up WTO membership in December, its own blueprint for liberalisation, published by the Ministry of Justice on 1 January, looks set to formalise the ban on international firms offering Chinese law advice.

At present local Chinese lawyers must give up their practising certificates if they join a foreign firm. The unprecedented prominence given to legal services in the GATS talks has raised expectations of reform in restrictive markets.

Law Society international directorate head Alison Hook told Legal Week Global: "Legal services in the last round were an afterthought. I am not sure why, but legal services are now number one priority and it feels like we are pushing on an open door."

However, Hook warned that some Western countries, including the US, were making GATS talks more difficult by not liberalising their own rules.