Alibaba subsidiary president arrested for bribes

HANGZHOU -- President of a subsidiary of China's e-commerce giant Alibaba has been arrested for taking bribes, Alibaba said Thursday.

The case involving Yan Limin, president of Juhuasuan.com, a group buying website, is still under police investigation, the company said in a statement, without elaborating.

Yan was sacked in March after several staffers at Juhuasuan.com were detained for taking bribes from store owners. Later investigation showed he also accepted bribes.

Juhuasuan.com reported a transaction volume of more than 10 billion yuan ($1.6 billion) last year, accounting for about half of the market share in China.

Alibaba said it will continue the open and transparent crackdown on credit fraud and Internet extortion that has been plaguing China's thriving e-commerce.

In the first half of the year, 28 Alibaba employees were found to have committed "irregularities". Of them, seven have been transferred to judicial authorities.

Alibaba said in May that it had shut nine stores using its subsidiary Taobao.com, China's largest online retailer, after they allegedly bribed Taobao employees for illegal gains.

The business owners were suspected of conspiring with Taobao employees to cheat consumers by removing negative feedback posts and raising their credit ratings.