PARIS?France said Monday it would spend 750 million euros to digitally scan its national treasures, vowing to protect its heritage at a time of suspicions over Google's digitization drive.

"We are going to launch a big public-private partnership" to digitize national holdings such as archives and museum pieces "while still staying in charge of our heritage," President Nicolas Sarkozy said in a speech.

"There is no question of letting this heritage go," he said.

Sarkozy announced a $6.8 billion (4.5 billion euro) package to roll out a high-speed Internet network across France and digitize the country's cultural heritage.

He said 750 million euros would go to "digitization of the content of our museums, our libraries and our cinematographic heritage."

The package was part of his government's "grand loan"?a capital investment spree aimed at boosting France's economic growth and competitiveness.

Digitization has become bound up with the sensitive issue of protecting French cultural and intellectual property in recent months.

French publishers have accused the US-based online giant Google of breaching their copyright by scanning books for publication in its online library Google Books.

Meanwhile, a government report due out on Tuesday was expected to make recommendations on a possible partnership with a private company to scan the contents of France's state-controlled libraries and museums.

Culture Minister Frederic Mitterrand met last week with Google's vice president David Drummond and expressed his "concern" about the company's book-scanning activities.

Sarkozy said on Monday that "our first effort must be to ensure coverage of the territory with high-speed Internet" through a state-backed program that he said would be presented in the coming days.