Chinese police have detained on bribery charges the deputy chief of a village which attracted worldwide attention when it rebelled against its Communist leaders, state media said Friday.

Yang Semao, one of the leaders of the 2011 uprising in the southern village of Wukan, which saw locals drive out Communist Party officials who were accused of illegal land grabs, was detained on Thursday, the official Xinhua news agency said.

The report suggests a further blow to villagers' hopes of retrieving their land after a committee chosen in unprecedented free elections failed in their attempts to completely recover it.

Local investigating authorities have accused Yang of "taking bribes in public projects in the village" Xinhua said, without giving details.

In 2011 the villagers of Wukan mounted huge protests, and only relented when provincial authorities granted the elections -- seen as a breakthrough for citizen rights in a state that quashes unrest when local officials requisition land to sell to developers at huge profit.

But the elation faded as the rebels-turned-officials discovered it was beyond their power to wrangle land back from unwilling city authorities, influential companies and a web of legally binding plot sales.

Yang told AFP in December that out of about 6,500 mu (430 hectares or 1,100 acres) of land being sought, villagers had retrieved only a little over 10 percent, while around a third was effectively gone forever.

He admitted the new village committee had lost the support of many residents, saying: "They don't trust us because we haven't met their interests."

Xinhua reported that 330 hectares of land had been returned to the village. Wukan held another election on Tuesday and a new 11-strong leadership will be formed early next month, it reported.

Crackdown hits popular China messaging platform WeChat
Shanghai (AFP) March 14, 2014 - Chinese Internet giant Tencent has shut several accounts on its popular instant messaging platform WeChat, users said Friday, in what appeared to be part of a broader government crackdown on political content.

WeChat -- known as "weixin" or micro-message in Chinese -- has more than 300 million users in China and overseas, allowing them to send text, photos, videos and voice messages over mobile devices.

Accounts shut down included one for "Union of Elephants" which specialised in irreverent takes on current affairs, and "Consensus Net" which featured articles on topics such as democracy.

Chinese authorities maintain a huge surveillance network, including online, where the so-called Great Firewall of China blocks access to sites deemed sensitive and a vast censorship machine deletes content considered objectionable.

One WeChat user whose account was shut down, who asked not to be named, estimated more than 20 accounts were closed.

The accounts were suspended on Thursday without prior notice or follow-up explanation from Tencent, he said.

Tencent, owner of WeChat, could not be reached for comment on Friday. But a Tencent official said late Thursday that messages that violated Chinese law faced a crackdown.

"To guarantee user experience... the release of pornographic, violent, rumour-spreading information, and other types of information which violate laws, regulations and relevant policies are strictly prohibited," Marsh Zhang, a publicity director at Tencent, said in a posting on his personal microblog.

"As soon as they are discovered, we will severely crack down and deal with them," he said, but made no specific reference to accounts being closed.

Other affected accounts included those of Luo Changping -- who blew the whistle on a corrupt government official while a journalist -- and columnist Xu Danei, who also writes for the Chinese website of Britain's Financial Times newspaper and domestic outlets.

Some pointed out online that the closures came on the final day of the annual session of the National People's Congress, or legislature, while others linked them to rumours about the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, which had 153 Chinese passengers on board.

The crackdown mirrors similar action against another popular form of social media in China, microblogs or "weibo", equivalents of Twitter, which have been hit by government tightening over both content and users.

After the move, Tencent's Hong Kong-listed shares closed down just over four percent on Friday.