$re = '/(/\*\s*ABCD[^*/]*)\*/\s*/\*\s*Comment[^*:]+:(\s*\[\[[^][]*]]\s*\*/)/m';
$str = '/* ABCD X 1111 */ /* Comment 1111: [[reason for comment]] */';
$subst = "\1#\2";
$result = preg_replace($re, $subst, $str);
echo "The result of the substitution is ".$result;
Please keep in mind that these code samples are automatically generated and are not guaranteed to work. If you find any syntax errors, feel free to submit a bug report. For a full regex reference for PHP, please visit: http://php.net/manual/en/ref.pcre.php