Official toppled by lurid online story

Yi Junqing (file photo)

A senior official has lost his job after a woman claiming to be his mistress posted a 120,000-word account of their alleged love affair online.

She later apologized and said she had made up the story.

However, Xinhua news agency reported yesterday that Yi Junqing, head of the Party's compilation and translation bureau, had been removed from the post for his "improper lifestyle."

Chang Yan, a postdoctoral researcher at the bureau, recounted in her post 17 incidents when she claimed to have slept with Yi and said she had offered him tens of thousands of yuan to be with him.

Chang, a married woman from Shanxi Province, said she did so to obtain a Beijing hukou, a permanent residence permit, but failed. She said Yi had at least two other mistresses.

After she found Yi couldn't help her get the permit, she claimed she asked for "compensation" and said Yi offered her 1 million yuan (US$160,740).

Chang also e-mailed the account to colleagues in the bureau.

She later deleted the online account and said she had made it up.

Chang said she had been suffering from depression due to pressure of work.

An online apology posted in place of her article read: "In my spare time I put together a work of fiction." It continued: "I suffered serious depression ... and regularly sank into a state of delusion and even fantasy."

The fall of Yi, who had a rank equivalent to vice minister, comes as the Communist Party's new leaders have declared war on corruption.

Since taking charge in November, the new Party leaders have stressed that corruption is a scourge, with Party chief Xi Jinping saying it could "kill the Party."

A number of lower-level officials have been shamed in the media, with one facing investigation for allegedly keeping twins as mistresses and another sacked after a sex video spread online.

Several senior officials have also come under investigation, including the vice Party chief of southwest China's Sichuan Province and a former deputy mayor of the manufacturing hub of Shenzhen in Guangdong Province.

Yi, 55, had been director of the bureau since 2010. The bureau's many duties included research into Marxism and its development, and preparing foreign translations of important documents.