XINING, May 24 -- A police officer from northwest China's Qinghai Province was detained Sunday for being suspected of poaching endangered animals, local authority said.

The officer, head of the Longmen Township Police Station in Tianjun County, was also dismissed from his post, according to the county government's publicity department.

Online posts have spread on twitter-like Sina Weibo since Friday afternoon, saying police officers in Longmen are killing endangered animals including Mongolian gazelle, wild horses and tercels.

Online photos exposed that bodies of the Przewalski's gazelle, a rare species only found in China, as well as unskinned and dismembered animals were stored in the police station.

The plateau province of Qinghai is home to many endangered wild animals, including the Tibetan antelope, wild yak and Tibetan wild donkey.