Officials with the following misconduct should be removed from their posts:

    -- Making a wrong decision that leads to great losses or has serious negative impact;

    -- Serious or a spate of accidents or cases occurred in the official's jurisdiction or working unit due to his or her dereliction of duties;

    -- Serious or a spate of accidents or cases occurred in the official's scope of duty due to lax management or supervision by government;

    -- Power abuse, malfeasance, or order or encourage others to commit illegal administrative activities, which lead to group protest or other serious incidents;

    -- Incorrect handling of group protests or accidents, which exacerbates the situation or has serious negative impact;

    -- Violating official selection or appointment regulations, which leads to mistakes in appointing officials and have serious negative impact;

    -- Other conduct that harms national interests, results in great losses to people's lives, personal or public property, or has serious negative impact.

    A spate of corrupt misconduct in recent years triggered nationwide investigations into officials' accountability. In one of the latest cases, 14 officials were dismissed in Chaohu City ineast Anhui Province for running a jobs-for-money network.

    Zhou Guangquan, the former Communist Party secretary of Chaohu city, was accused of accepting bribes worth 5 million yuan (about 735,000 U.S dollars) on June 3.

    Prosecutors then discovered that among the 36 people who bribedZhou when he was secretary of the Communist Party of China Chaohu City Committee from 2000 to 2004, 19 were government officials whowere promoted after giving Zhou bribes.

    According to the fresh regulation, officials will be given evenmore severe punishment if they interfere with the investigation oftheir misconduct, forge and hide evidences or take revenge on whistleblowers.

    Officials with serious misconduct will be transferred to judicial departments for further investigation and punishment if their misconduct is deemed criminal.

    Officials have the right to testify for themselves before a accountability decision is made, and "reasonable opinions" will betaken into account, said the regulation.

    Also, a decision must be brought to leading officials for groupdiscussion before it becomes final.

    Chinese disciplinary organs have punished 2,386 officials at orabove prefectural level for their misconduct from July 2003 to December 2008, according to the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI).

    Another 29,905 officials at county level were also punished during the same period, the CCDI said.