It is believed that the lawmakers will adopt the committee's suggestion on December 29 when the current session ends.

As part of the draft civil code, the property bill was submitted to the NPC Standing Committee for the first review in 2002 and withdrawn from the NPC full session last March amid worries that the draft, the country's first specific law to protect private ownership, might undermine the legal foundation of China's socialist system.

The draft was further revised last August to install state ownership at the heart of the economic system after 15,000 suggestion from the public were pooled. It also added measures to prevent fraudulent acquisitions and mergers of state assets.

The latest version, which tries to strike a balance between private property and state ownership, says all market players enjoy equal legal status and rights for development.

It adds new clauses that prohibit illegal possession, open looting, private partition, withholding and demolishing of state assets. Similar clauses were also added for the collective and private property.

The NPC Standing Committee members are also debating new clauses to the law that will allow farmers to prolong their land contracts when the contracts expire.

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