Two Chinese officials have been detained for falsifying compensation claims for land expropriated for a nuclear plant project, the procuratorate in the southern Hainan Province said Saturday.

Chen Aimin, head of a station of the bureau of land and resources in Changjiang County, and Zheng Fuheng, a village officer, were charged with assessing the land appropriated and distributing compensation.

An initial investigation showed they had collaborated in illegally earning 126,765 yuan (18,580 U.S. dollars) by reporting an extra 5.88 mu (0.4 hectare) of land or forest areas to the land expropriation authorities, said a procuratorate official.

Residents of Sanlian Village, where a key nuclear plant project is to be built, reported the suspected scam to the county-level procuratorate early this year, which prompted investigators to resurvey the land to be taken for the national project.

The procuratorate will investigate further before proceeding with a prosecution.

With a total investment of 30 billion yuan, construction of the first stage of the Changjiang project is expected to begin in October with two generating units with a capacity of 650,000 kw in operation by 2014.

China plans to build five nuclear power stations in the eastern Zhejiang and Shandong provinces and southern Guangdong and Hainan provinces this year.

Construction of the Sanmen Nuclear Power Plant in Zhejiang started last month.

(Xinhua News Agency May 9, 2009)