SHANGHAI, Aug. 3 -- THE local branch of a German publishing company finds itself at the center of controversy after it transferred a pregnant magazine designer and planner to a job cleaning toilets.

The decision has led to heavy criticism in online chat rooms, but human resource professionals and labor officials said the company didn't break the law.

The company decided in May to shut down the team the woman worked on and lay off more than 10 employees.

The company could not lay off the woman, who would only identify herself by the surname Ju on the Internet, or cut her salary because she was three-months pregnant at the time and protected by labor laws.

This Monday, Ju said that she received a notice from the human resources department telling her she would be moved to a cleaning job, that includes washing toilets at least three times a day, delivering mail, cleaning the employees' glasses and buying lunch boxes for them.

"I did prepare myself for an unfavorable position, but it never occurred to me it would be a toilet cleaner," said Ju.

She said she plans to negotiate with the company's manager when he returns from a business trip. If that doesn't work, she plans to quit.

Despite the demotion, the company will continue to pay Ju 9,000 yuan (US$1,188) a month, making her perhaps the highest paid toilet cleaner in Shanghai's history. Most janitors earn 1,000 yuan to 1,500 yuan a month.

The company's HR manager who only identified herself as Kitty insisted that the company didn't have any spare vacancies for Ju after her original program was canceled.

"Is it decent to ask a pregnant woman to bend her waist and wash toilets everyday?" asked Zhong Xiuting, a local office worker.

Sui Wei, vice director of the Shanghai Labor Arbitration Commission, said that the company was pushing the envelope. The issue is a moral problem rather than legal, he said.