Taiwan's National Palace Museum on Wednesday ruled out accepting looted relics, after a celebrity French collector reportedly said that his offer to donate two controversial animal heads had been turned down.

"In accordance with professional museum ethics, we can't collect disputed artefacts," said Chou Kung-shin, director of the museum which boasts the world's largest collection of classical Chinese art.

The two bronze heads, stolen from China 150 years ago, were the subject of an auction house drama earlier this year when a Chinese collector won a bid for them but subsequently refused to pay, placing the deal in limbo.

Pierre Berge, partner of late French fashion designer Yves Saint Laurent, said he offered the two heads -- of a rat and a rabbit -- to a Taiwan museum, but was rejected because the museum feared triggering Chinese anger.

"I wanted to give them to the Taiwan museum, but they didn't want to create a bone of contention... with mainland China," Berge told French radio station RTL in a programme aired on Monday.

Berge did not name the museum, but Taiwan's Liberty Times on Wednesday quoted the National Palace Museum as saying it turned down the gift because "the artefacts didn't fit its collections."

The museum later clarified, saying it was never approached by Berge but would turn down the offer for that reason if it ever were, according to the newspaper.

The museum's director Chou reiterated her position on rejecting looted artefacts at a parliamentary session on Wednesday, provoking criticism from lawmakers.

"The museum is spineless. (Berge) wants to give the relics to you and you won't even accept?" said Lee Ching-hua, a lawmaker from the ruling Kuomintang party.

The National Museum of History, another leading Taiwanese museum, is "very willing to accept" the relics, its director Huang Yung-chuan told reporters on Wednesday.

The two bronzes were stolen by British and French forces from Beijing at the end of the Second Opium War in 1860.

They later became part of the collection of Saint Laurent and Berge, and sold for 15.7 million euros (23 million dollars) each at the Christie's auction in Paris in March.

Authorities in Beijing had repeatedly called for the sale not to go ahead and said the relics should be returned to China.

A Chinese art collector admitted he was the bidder but said he had no intention of paying the money.