China Red Cross donates 700 mln yuan to charity programs in 2008

BEIJING, Jan. 29 (Chinese media) -- Chinese Red Cross

Foundation donated a total of 732 million yuan (about 104 million U.S. dollars)

in cash and property to charity programs in 2008, more than eight times the

figure of 2007, said the foundation council Thursday.

The foundation received 1.537 billion yuan (about 220

million of U.S. dollars) in donations from both domestic and overseas sources

last year, nine times the figure of 2007, said Wang Rupeng, deputy-director of

the board.

Wang said 90 percent of the donation was received for

disaster-relief work in Sichuan and other quake-hit areas in China, while the

Red Cross Angel Program, which provides medical aid to poor areas, received 104

million yuan, and the Bo'Ai Aid Program for poor students received 36.95

million.

Rupeng said that the Angel Program helped to train

400 rural doctors, and provided aid to about 7,800 people with leukemia,

congenital heart disease, cleft lip and palate, deafness, paraplegia and cancer.

The Bo'ai Aid Program trained 100 rural teachers,

helped 107 needy students to complete their middle school study, and built 556

Red Cross libraries for rural middle and primary schools.

Wang said that more than 6.9 million people had

benefited from the total of 2,194 clinics, 194 schools and 1,112 libraries the

foundation had built throughout the country by the end of 2008.

He said that the foundation planned to establish

social supervision committees for construction projects in quake-hit areas, to

guarantee that the donated money was used transparently and efficiently.