Six elderly Chinese in Anqing City in the eastern province of Anhui have taken their lives to protest a city law banning coffin burials.

Beginning June 1, the city government orders that all Chinese who die in Anqing City have to be cremated and not buried in coffins.

The city government is among a growing number of local governments throughout China banning coffin burials to conserve what they claim is diminishing land space in cemeteries.

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This puzzling government move runs counter to the Chinese tradition of ancestor worship,  which normally requires families to bury their relatives and build a tomb for therm. Some families spend up to a decade preparing their coffins.

The Beijing News said six senior citizens in Anqing committed suicide "to avoid the new regulations on funerals," citing family members of the deceased.

It reported that city government officials began forcibly confiscating coffins from locals in May, causing "a huge psychological impact" on city residents. Opponents of the ban said the seizure of the coffins was illegal because the coffins were the property of their owners.

Residents of Anqing were only informed of the burial ban in April, two months before the new regulations were to come into force.

The newspaper reported that a 91-year-old woman named Wu Zhengde hanged herself on May 5 after learning of the new regulations. A woman identified as Zheng Shifang, 83, killed herself after officials sawed her coffin in half in front of her.

A 68-year-old woman committed suicide by jumping into a well while others drank poison to protest the ban on coffin burials.

Press reports said local officials in other parts of China have are continuing to flatten graves to create land for farming and development. Officials in Henan Province provoked nationwide anger in 2012 by demolishing 400,000 graves.

The local government of Anqing, however, claimed the suicides were not connected to the burial ban and that people were giving up their coffins voluntarily.

TagsCoffin burial, Chinese burial practices, China elderly, Cremation