The Chinese Movie Copyright Association says TV stations air up to 1,500 pirated Chinese movies a year, costing studios up to 75 million yuan (HK$73.23 million) in lost revenues, Xinhua News Agency reported Sunday.

"The number of movies illegally aired is startling - more than 100 in the first six months of the year, and most of them are very recent," Meng Yu, the association's legal director, was quoted as saying.

The accusation adds a new wrinkle to complaints that China is the world's leading source of illegally copied movies.

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Beijing is under pressure from its trading partners to stamp out the piracy. But China's own studios say the damage to them is even greater than to their foreign competitors as pirates rob them of their important domestic market.

The copyright association's members say mainland television stations show 1,200 to 1,500 of their movies without permission every year.

China Educational TV Station was last month ordered to pay 50,000 yuan to another mainland channel for showing one of its movies without permission.

ETV had argued that the movie was part of a noncommercial program on patriotic movies to educate the public. However, the broadcaster was found to have made 130,000 yuan from advertising.

ASSOCIATED PRESS