Pirate video compact discs made from copies illegally shot in cinemas account for more than 20% of video disc sales in local markets.

The Xinhua news agency said the decision was announced in a decree from the city's copyright administration.

China's video pirates are notorious for making hundreds of millions of dollars from fake compact video and music discs every year.

Discs crushed

Earlier in 1998, for example, hundreds of thousands of people in China watched Titanic even before any Chinese cinema started showing it.

Although several Chinese cities used road rollers to crush five million illegal discs confiscated by customs earlier this year, trade is still flourishing. This year the haul of confiscated discs is expected to be even larger.

In Beijing, you don't have to look hard to find fake discs. On a stroll through any of the main tourist markets 'hallo, CD' is so frequently heard it could be mistaken for a formal greeting.

For the equivalent of two dollars, you can buy a counterfeit copy of any latest Hollywood movie or rock music album.

Black market racketeers have an easier job than in other parts of the world because in China the video compact disc is standard - a more easily concealed format than the bulky video cassette.

And although a few months ago the government set up three new official CD factories to try to reduce the demand for pirate discs, the new measures will only address a small part of the problem.