Winning bidder for sculptures won't pay

Two looted bronze sculptures claimed by China and once owned by Yves Saint Laurent were "bought" at a Paris auction by a Chinese bidder who said on yesterday he would not pay any money.

The two sculptures, representing the head of a rat and the head of a rabbit, were bought for 15,745,000 ($40.74 million) each by a telephone bidder during the auction of the late designer's art collection last week. But the man who said he made the bid, an adviser to a Chinese fund for looted artworks, said no money would change hands for relics stolen from Beijing's torched Summer Palace in 1860 by French and British forces.

"What I want to stress is that this money cannot be paid," the adviser, Cai Mingchao, told a news conference.