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BSI said that following a "rigorous review process" it decided that it couldn't approve the current OOXML specification as an ISO standard. The BSI is the UK's representative at the ISO (International Organisation for Standardisation).

"In the UK, a technical panel comprising large and small companies, public sector organisations, user groups, academia and government, was specially created to review ISO/IEC DIS 29500 OOXML [the 6,000 page specficiation]," BSI says in a statement. "It identified a number of technical issues in the document which need to be addressed before the UK can approve ISO/IEC DIS 29500 OOXML as an International Standard."

Mike Low, director of British Standards, said that BSI now plans to work with JTC1 - the joint technical committee of ISO and the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) - to resolve issues raised by the "hundreds of comments on the draft standard".

The ISO is expected to announce the results of the ballot of the particpating national bodies later today. As this map shows, the outcome of that vote remains in the balance.