MANAGUA, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Nicaraguan legislators have approved a law to protect the Bosawas biosphere reserve in the northeast of the country, an opposition deputy said Wednesday.

    The Nicaraguan National Assembly approved the Soil Use Conservation Law in the Bosawas reserve on Tuesday, said Maximino Rodriguez from the Constitutionalist Liberal Party.

    The law establishes measures to prevent illegal wood trafficking in the region, which is the second largest rainforest in the Americas after the Amazon in Brazil and represents 15.25 percent of the national territory.

    Rodriguez said that wood has been sold illegally in El Salvador and Honduras, where it was widely used for making furniture and other products.

    Moreover, a million hectares of woods in the area were destroyed in September last year by hurricane Felix.

    President of the parliamentary Environment Commission Carlos Garcia said the new law imposes penal and administrative sanctions.

    "This law is against the people from the north of the country who are used to the felling and burning of trees," said Garcia, who is from the Nicaraguan Liberal Alliance.

    The Bosawas reserve is the largest tract of tropical rainforest north of the Amazon. It is home to indigenous Miskito and Mayangna people whose traditional life style causes little habitat disturbance.