BEIJING, July 25 (Reuters) - China has not misused its anti-monopoly law as a trade barrier, a senior U.S. official said on Monday, brushing aside some of the criticism that Beijing has used it to unfairly block the expansion of global firms in the country.
The Chinese Commerce Ministry's rejection of a bid by Coca-Cola to buy local fruit juice maker Huiyuan in 2009, saying the proposed transaction would have been bad for industry competition, attracted particular attention.

But U.S. Federal Trade Commission Chairman Jon Leibowitz said China's sometimes controversial 2008 anti-monopoly law was a step in the right direction for the country.
"The Chinese anti-monopoly law and its implementation has shown a lot of promise," he told reporters in Beijing. "It takes a while for any agency to ... hit the institutional sweet spot."

"We haven't seen any indication, at least in our interactions, of misuse of anti-trust, in a trade barrier sense," Leibowitz said.

In 2008, China also rejected buyout giant Carlyle's $375 million bid for Xugong, China's biggest construction equipment maker.

Under the law, enterprises with annual revenue of 10 billion yuan ($1.55 billion) globally and 400 million yuan in China must seek government approval for a proposed acquisition.

When asked about cases like that of Coca-Cola and Huiyuan, Leibowitz said: "Any new agency, even one that shows great promise, may have a hiccup or two, but I don't want to comment on any specific cases."

"There's nothing specific that we've asked them to change. We just want to help them develop a capability of a mature anti-trust agency; we think they're mostly on the way."
Leibowitz is visiting China to sign a Memorandum of Understanding on anti-trust and anti-monopoly cooperation between his department and the U.S. Department of Justice and China's Commerce Ministry, National Development and Reform Commission and State Administration for Industry and Commerce.

The MoU will see high level consultations, an exchange of information about enforcement and policy and also cooperation on specific cases or investigations, mainly for mergers, he added.

"As we see more deals involving Chinese and American companies, or multinational companies with major Chinese and American presences, we'll do more work together. That's a good thing." ($1 = 6.445 Chinese Yuan)