Prosecutors in east China's Zhejiang Province said Tuesday they were investigating the bribery of You Jie, wife of a former Chinese official who had been ousted from the Party and his post for refusing to return from a trip to Europe last September.

You was suspected of accepting bribes of hundreds of thousand yuan from companies in the disguise of stock trading in 2007, provincial prosecutors said.

One of her personal bank accounts was found to have a suspicious flow of about 80 million yuan.

The Zhejiang Provincial People's Procuratorate arrested You in early February.

You's husband, Yang Xianghong, former secretary of the Lucheng District Committee of the Communist Party of China in Wenzhou City, was fired and expelled from the Party last November after he failed to return from a trip to Europe.

Yang departed on Sept. 19 on a 12-day official tour to Europe. But he left the delegation before the return trip, saying he was suffering serious back pain which prevented him from taking a long trip by air. The other members of the delegation returned from Paris on Sept. 29 as scheduled.

The provincial Party committee ordered the Wenzhou municipal Party committee to persuade Yang to receive treatment at home. The city sent a group to Paris on Oct. 23 in the hope of bringing him back, but they were unsuccessful.

Yang was accused of "damaging the Party's image and ruining the country's reputation." His wrongdoing also infringed on China's law on public servants and the Party's disciplines, the provincial CPC committee said.

Yang remains missing.

(Xinhua News Agency March 31, 2009)