KIA has secured a 1% share of the European new car market for the first time.

The manufacturer says that according to the latest official pan-European new car sales it sold a total of 7,942 vehicles in 18 European countries last month.

This represents a 31.6% increase over August 2002, completely against the downward market trend which saw overall sales for August slump by 4.7%.

In the first eight months of 2003, Kia sold a total of 75,329 new cars in Europe, an increase of 60.6% over the same period of 2002. The market was down 2.2%.

Jean-Charles Lievens, vice-president of Kia Motor Europe, said: 'Kia's sales performance across Europe, especially of the Sorento, the Carens and Rio, continues to beat the market trends by a substantial margin.'

In a downtrend market, Kia's product range, competitive positioning and quality of customer service, are conquesting new customers.'