Taiwan delays China quake aid over transparency

TAIPEI, July 9 (Reuters) - Taiwan, one of the biggest aid donors to victims of the deadly China earthquake, is withholding more than T$1 billion ($33 million) amid fears of non-transparency, an official said on Wednesday.

Taiwan is seeking a secure channel for the money, which the government began collecting days after the May 12 Sichuan province quake that killed about 80,000 people, as some donors object to turning it over directly to China, said policy-making Mainland Affairs Council Vice-Chairman Johnnason Liu.

Beijing had asked Taiwan to send the money via a China-based charity, Liu said. But Taiwan wrote back asking China to list specific projects in areas such as sanitation, reconstruction and psychological help to survivors.

"We don't want to send it directly to mainland China, we want to give it to specific projects," Liu told Reuters. "We want the other side to give us a clear window."

Some individual donors fear that "the mainland has some transparency issues," he said.

His agency, which is putting up more than two thirds of the money in question, has not heard back from China.

China has claimed sovereignty over self-ruled Taiwan since the end of the Chinese civil war in 1949, Beijing has vowed to bring the island back under its rule, by force if necessary.

But in May Taiwan quickly became a top donation source to demonstrate gratitude for help that it received from overseas after a major quake hit the island in September 1999.

Taiwan's public massed T$2.2 billion days after the China quake, local media said. By the end of May, the Chinese government said it had received or been promised more than 800 million yuan ($115.3 million) in cash and other donations from Taiwan business people, both in China and in Taiwan.

(Reporting by Ralph Jennings; Editing by Jeremy Laurence)