A Chinese lawmaker has been arrested in connection with the murder of his mistress with a car bomb earlier this month.

Duan Yihe, chairman of the Standing Committee of the Jinan Municipal People's Congress, is alleged to have hired his nephew-in-law, a Jinan policeman, to plant the car bomb that killed Liu Haiping on July 9, according to a source with the Shandong Provincial Public Security Department.

Police found remnants of the bomb in Liu's car after the blast, which killed her on the spot.

Duan, 61, a deputy to the current tenth National People's Congress - China's top legislature - began an intimate relationship with Liu, 30 years his younger, in 1993 when she worked at a local hotel, he admitted to the police.

With Duan's help, Liu secured employment in the Jinan Financial Bureau and then the Municipal Bureau of State Land and Resources. Her two sisters also secured more high-paying jobs.

An investigation revealed that Liu, who owns three houses, has more than 2 million yuan (more than US$263,000) in personal assets. But the source of the properties is still unclear.

Duan had been trying to split up with Liu since 1999 due to what he termed as "conflicts" in their relationship, but Liu refused.

Duan told police he had just wanted to arrange a traffic accident with the help of his nephew-in-law Chen Zhi, an officer with the Jinan Municipal Public Security Bureau, so that Liu would "lose her ability to think".

On July 9, Chen planted explosives in Liu's car and set off the blast by remote control when Liu was driving. Chen has been detained.

Witnesses said pieces of Liu's body were lying on the road and her car was wrecked. A taxi, which crashed into Liu's car, was engulfed in flames, but the driver survived the explosion with some injuries.

On Monday, Duan was stripped of his membership of the national legislature at a conference of the Standing Committee of the Shandong Provincial People's Congress.

He has also been expelled from the Communist Party of China and removed from Party posts.

Duan, who has been working in the CPC's organization departments at county, municipal and provincial levels since 1976, was promoted to chairman of the Standing Committee of the Jinan municipal legislature in 2001.

The exposure of Duan's case comes in the wake of news that 95 Party officials in north China's Shanxi Province had been punished for their involvement in the forced labor scandal at local brick kilns.

(Xinhua News Agency July 17, 2007)