(Decanter) - France is being broadly backed by the European Commission in its call for safeguards on who gets access to .wine and .vin internet domain names, setting up a potential legal showdown with the US government. 

Enraged French officials said today (26 June) that the body responsible for assigning web domain names, ICANN, is unfit to govern.

Their comments are the latest in a week-long tirade from France's government, which is upset that ICANN has refused to halt its planned release of .wine and .vin internet 'top-level domain' names.

Winemakers' associations in Europe and also in ICANN's home state of California have spent the past year lobbying for controls on who would be able to register a name such as Champagne, Bordeaux, Napa or Barolo using .wine or .vin. They argue the system will be open to fraud and could also confuse consumers. 

The issue has reawakened a festering international dispute over whether the European Union should be able to use its Geographical Indications system to claim a monopoly on particular wine names. Although trade body Napa Valley Vintners has sided with its European counterparts, ICANN has been accused of favouring the US government's long-held, anti-GI position.