The repair of what was one of the world's biggest city walls is progressing well in this capital of Jiangsu Province, east China.

The city has spent 60 million yuan this year on the repair of 4.2 km of the wall, and another 300 million yuan on cleaning up the surrounding areas, according to Yang Xinhua, deputy head of the Municipal Bureau of Cultural Relics.

Plus the three km of the wall repaired earlier, the city has repaired seven km of the ancient city wall, and all the seriously damaged sections of the wall have now been put under protection.

The city wall in Nanjing was built between 1366 and 1386, in the Ming Dynasty. It was 33.676 km long, 14 to 21 m high and 14 m wide at the bottom. At that time, it was the largest capital city wall in the world.

However, only 21 km of the wall have survived more than 600 years of weathering and human damage.

(Eastday.com.cn 08/16/2001)