Just weeks after China passed a pioneering property law, a couple's fight for their house in Chongqing, western China, is providing a headline-grabbing test of the government's promise to protect private title rights.

Wu Ping and her husband have held out for nearly three years against developers trying to clear the area for a large commercial development. The frustrated developers, in turn, have simply dug round the Wus' house, leaving it stranded like an ancient citadel above a 10 metre-deep hole.