Beijing - Another senior railway official has reportedly been detained under a graft probe.

Su Shunhu, deputy chief of the transport bureau of the Ministry of Railways, was suspended from his post last month amid an investigation into possible corruption, according to a report on Wednesday by eeo.com.cn, a Chinese economic and business news portal.

The report cited anonymous insiders in the ministry, saying Su was suspected of having abused power to help a coalmine owner in the Inner Mongolia autonomous region transport coal by trains. Su was accused of having received a property in Beijing in return, which was part of the reason he was interrogated, the report said.

Su is the second bureau-level official to be detained after his superior officer Zhang Shuguang, former director of the bureau and the ministry's deputy chief engineer, was removed from office in late February. Zhang was sacked for corruption involving the country's high-speed rail projects.

Su made his last public appearance in early June, when the landmark Beijing-Shanghai high-speed railway was about to open. Media reports earlier quoted him as having said the new fast line would greatly benefit cargo transportation on the existing line due to splitting passenger from cargo transportation.

The fall of the two senior officials has increased speculation about how many railway officials may end up being investigated, following the removal of former minister of railways Liu Zhijun in February for alleged "severe violation of discipline".

In June, three senior officials at Nanchang Railway Bureau and Hohhot Railway Bureau were put under investigation, signaling fights with corruption have reached local railway authorities.

Su graduated from the then Lanzhou Railway University with a bachelor's degree in 1980 and received an MBA degree at Peking University in 2003. He had the title of adjunct professor at Beijing Jiaotong University and was a member of the national work safety expert team.