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Rui Chenggang's anchor chair was left empty for Friday night's newscast on China Central Television after prosecutors detained the star journalist shortly before airtime.It appeared that Rui, known for his "big get" interviews as well as nationalistic sentiment,Philips C5 2 was taken into custody less than an hour before the start of "Economic News," which his co anchor presented alone.Speculation about Rui's troubles began last month when his longtime patron Guo Zhenxi, the head of state run CCTV's financial news channel, was detained for allegedly accepting bribes. Several other senior figures at the channel were also implicated, the government said.'Face of New China'Rui, 37, denied through an assistant last month that he was under investigation. He tweeted at the time to his 10 million followers on Sina Weibo China's equivalent of Twitter a philosophical conversation between two ancient Zen masters that implied time would eventually clear his name.State media cited CCTV sources on Saturday as saying that Rui's detention was closely linked to Guo's case, as well as an investigation into his own possible profiting from using CCTV resources.Rui, who's known for wearing designer suits and driving fast cars, commands more social media followers than any other CCTV personality and has been called the "face of the New China" by his admirers.His official CCTV bio says he has interviewed hundreds of business and political leaders around the world. The New York Times has profiled him and even the popular American comedy program "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart" has featured him in an episode.Fluent in English, Rui began his broadcast career at CCTV's international service, but his stardom soared under Guo after the young journalist jumped to the network's financial news channel in 2008. He successfully led a controversial campaign to kick Starbucks out of Beijing's Forbidden City in 2007, calling the American coffee shop's presence in the historic palace museum an encroachment on Chinese culture. President Barack Obama said he would give the final question at a news conference in Seoul to South Korean media. "I'm actually Chinese, but I think I get to represent the entire Asia," Rui said before asking a long winded question on how Obama might prevent his policies from being misinterpreted. ambassador to China, a question that some critics called a nationalistic publicity stunt. Others applauded it as a sign of an increasingly confident China standing up to the United States.Locke replied that it was standard government policy for American diplomats and other officials to fly coach.'Tigers and flies'Rui's reported detention came on the heels of the downfall of several former high ranking officials, including a retired top general of the 2 million strong People's Liberation Army.