A cellphone short message has played a crucial part in a lawsuit, helping to solve a troublesome debt case in Nanning, capital of south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.

A citizen surnamed Zeng lodged a lawsuit to the people's court of Nanning's Yongxin District in early 2004 that a man surnamed Wang had deliberately delayed the repayment of the loan and requested that he pay the money back immediately.

Zeng said in September, 2002, Wang borrowed 30,000 yuan (about 3,628 US dollars) from him, and they made an oral agreement that all the money would be returned within three months and a key to Wang's suite in the city and its two invoices would serve as a guarantee.

However, Zeng did not ask Wang to write a receipt when he lent the money. Sure enough, Wang delayed the repayment of the loan when the deadline expired.

After over a year of fruitless attempts, Zeng finally decided to get his money back by legal means.

Despite a subpoena, Wang had neither vindicated himself nor provided any evidence to the court and he did not show up to the court.

A staff with the court said it had proved difficult to solve the case because it could not be proved that Wang had received themoney without the receipt.

Yet a short message stored in Zeng's cell phone became a turning point of the whole case.

On Feb. 8, 2003, Wang sent a short message to Zeng, asking to postpone the deadline of the repayment.

Zeng then provided the short message as proof to the court. After checking the local telecom department, the court concluded that Wang had received the money and ordered him to repay all the money and the interest immediately.

When the defendants refused to cooperate with the court, neither defending themselves nor providing any proof, the court could settle the lawsuit based on short messages, said the staff.

(Xinhua News  Agency  April 5, 2004)