About 720,000 websites under the domain name of "CN" have been registered in China by the end of July 2005, according to latest statistics released by the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC).

This is the first time for China to surpass Japan in this area, making its domain name "CN" the largest in Asia, the Economic Daily reported on Wednesday.

In July about 100,000 websites under the "CN" domain name were registered, it says. Now Japan has about 630,000 website registered under its domain name.

China has over 100 million netizens and tens of millions of enterprises, so there is huge potential for the development of "CN" domain name, the newspaper says.

"The increasing register number under the CN domain name shows the revival of China's Internet industry," said CNNIC Director Mao Wei.

(Xinhua News Agency August 25, 2005)