Nov. 19 (Bloomberg) -- Lindt & Spruengli AG's European trademark rights on a chocolate Easter bunny wrapped in gold foil were gained ``honestly and fairly'' and it should be able to block copies, Lindt told the European Union's highest court.

Lindt, Switzerland's oldest chocolate maker, rejected an Austrian competitor's claims that it acquired the EU-wide protection ``in bad faith'' at a hearing today before the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg.

Lindt has blocked the Austrian company making products that are ``confusingly similar'' to its 56-year-old trademark rabbit, wrapped in gold foil with a bell and red ribbon around its neck.

``Here is a product that's been around for some 50 years and sold about 20 million times in the EU in 2000, when we applied for the trademark,'' said Gesine Hild, Lindt's lawyer. ``The company acted in good faith when it sought the right to exclude the use of that same product by others.''

The EU court could either force Austria's Franz Hauswirth GmbH, which has been making chocolate rabbits since 1960 in Austria, to change the look of its bunnies or cancel Lindt's EU trademark.

Lindt's sole motivation in applying for an EU trademark ``was its intention to block competitors,'' said Harald Schmidt, Hauswirth's lawyer.

Hild said that while Lindt was aware of competing products in Europe when it applied for the EU trademark in 2000, it didn't know of the Austrian company's products. Three years later Lindt learned of Hauswirth's bunny at a fair in Switzerland where Hauswirth presented them as ``a new product,'' Hild of Mayer Brown in Frankfurt said in an interview after the hearing.

Easter Symbol

Lindt, based in Kilchberg, Switzerland, started selling the bunnies in Austria in 1994. Chocolate bunnies have been sold in Austria and Germany since at least 1930, according to court documents.

``It's been a tradition in Germany and Austria for a long time that the bunny is a symbol for Easter; we didn't pioneer that idea,'' Hild told a five-judge panel at the court today. ``Lindt doesn't go after all the bunnies on the market, but we do when the overall image and appearance is so close to ours.''

The Court of Justice is expected to rule in about a year. Before that, an advocate general of the court will publish a non- binding opinion that may indicate how the final ruling will be made.

The case is Chocoladefabriken Lindt & Spruengli, C-529/07.

To contact the reporter on this story: Stephanie Bodoni in Luxembourg at sbodoni@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: November 19, 2008 09:40 EST