China has executed a mining billionaire for “organising and leading a mafia-style group”, murder and other crimes.

Former chairman of the Hanlong Group Liu Han, his younger brother Liu Wei and three accomplices were put to death this week, after they were charged with crimes linked to China's disgraced former security chief Zhou Yongkang.

Liu Han led private company Hanlong during a takeover bid for Sundance, a listed Australian iron ore firm, in 2011.

The $US1 billion deal collapsed in 2013, and media reports said at the time that Han had been detained.

Hanlong was based in Sichuan, one of the power bases of ex-security tsar Zhou.

Zhou enjoyed vast power in his government role, but became one of the highest-ranked ministers to be embroiled in a corruption investigation late last year.

Chinese business magazine Caixin says Liu Han had dealings with a businessman believed to be Zhou's son.

State media reports also hint that Liu Han and his gang had connections to central government officials.

“Liu's case first attracted attention with a very public murder on Jan. 10, 2009 in Guanghan, Sichuan,” Chinese media reports say. 

“At an open-air teahouse in downtown Guanghan, that afternoon witnesses watched as several men got out of a car, fired over 10 shots, and raced off in the same car.

“Three people were shot dead and two unrelated persons injured by stray bullets.

“Two suspects, Yuan Shaolin and Zhang Donghua, were soon captured and they had little hesitation in naming Liu Wei as the man behind the killing.

“By that time, Liu Wei had already absconded and became an MPS class-A wanted man.”

The same media outlet describes Liu Han’s brother Liu Wei as a former “boss of Guanghan Yiyuan Industrial Corporation and a popular entrepreneur and philanthropist”.

“However, to those who really knew him, Liu Wei is a ruthless underworld kingpin who controlled gambling, loan sharking and construction projects. Chen Fuwei, one of men slain in the teahouse, was Liu's sworn enemy.”