Beijing has restricted development close to the Great Wall of China to protect it from commercial encroachment, and made it a crime to damage its structure, local media reported.

No new development will be permitted within 1,650 feet of the wall, while commercial activities within two miles of it must undergo a special approval process, the reports said quoting a new law passed Thursday.

The law outlaws carving, painting, or plundering of stones or bricks from the wall and bans developers from setting up shops and stalls on it, the Beijing Times reported in its Friday edition.

It also restricts hiking and climbing along its unrestored sections and requires authorization for television and movie productions, the paper reported.

The law would be the most concrete legislation to date protecting the 390 miles of wall within the Beijing district from threats posed by economic development and growing numbers of visitors.

Already, chunks of the wall have been carted away to build homes or knocked down to make room for roads and buildings. Developers lease land at the wall's base for hotels and houses while visitors strew garbage across its surface and carve their names into its bricks.

Preservationists have long advocated legislation to protect the wall and its natural setting. A spokeswoman for one group, International Friends of the Great Wall, said on Saturday that parts of the new law appeared encouraging but couldn't comment further before seeing the law's full text.

Beijing has restored about 12 miles of the wall for tourists to visit. The rest lies in its original weathered state.

Altogether, the wall is about 1,800 miles long and stretches from the seacoast east of Beijing to Gansu province in the western desert. Parts of it are more than 2,000 years old, although the modern sections around Beijing date from the Ming Dynasty, which lasted from 1368 to 1644.