Agencies:

The Chinese online retail giant Alibaba said it has suspended several employees after one of the company's female employees accused her boss and a client of raping her under the influence of alcohol during a business trip.

The woman's description of the incident, which she published in an 11-page document that circulated widely on Chinese social media, sparked a huge online uproar, while the police said they are investigating the case.

Alibaba said in a statement carried by Reuters that "the group adopts a zero-tolerance policy towards sexual misconduct, and ensuring a safe workplace for all our employees is at the top of Alibaba's priorities."

A spokesperson for the group said, "We have suspended the parties involved who are suspected of violating our policies and values, and have established a special internal task force to investigate the case and support the ongoing police investigations."

Late on Saturday, a company employee posted her account of an incident she said occurred during a "business trip," claiming - without revealing her identity - that her boss forced her to go with him on a business trip to meet a client of their team in Jinan city, 900 km from Alibaba's headquarters in Hangzhou.

According to the woman, on the evening of July 27, the client kissed her, and after drinking alcohol, she woke up in a hotel room the next day without her clothes and without remembering what happened the previous evening.

The employee said she reported to the company's human resources department after returning to her city, and requested her boss be fired but "human resources did not follow up on what happened."

She added, according to the Washington Post, "They said they would not act, out of concern for my reputation."

Alibaba CEO Daniel Zhang responded to the uproar caused by the post late Saturday on the company's internal message board, according to Reuters sources, saying that "human resources alone should not apologize, but the relevant business management directors also bear responsibility and must apologize for their silence and failure to respond in a timely manner."

Last month, another moral scandal shook China when an 18-year-old Chinese student publicly accused the Chinese-Canadian pop singer Kris Wu of inciting her and other girls, some under the age of 18, to engage in immoral acts with him.

The incident revived discussions around the #MeToo movement in China, and police in Beijing arrested the singer who denied the allegations.