Planned negotiations to end a copyright row between Google and a group of Chinese writers have been postponed, leaving a formal apology hanging in the air.

Erik Hartmann, Google Book’s top negotiator in China, called his counterpart Zhang Hongbo, deputy director of China Written Works Copyright Society (CWWCS) around 10 am Tuesday morning and said Google wanted to postpone the negotiations due 2 pm that day.

“He (Erik) was friendly, but did not explain the exact reason, and we are communicating on when to restart the negotiation,” Zhang told China Daily via the phone.

Late Monday, Zhang told China Daily that CWWCS and Google planned to hold a press conference after the negotiations where they would make a formal apology.

A spokesperson for Google was unavailable.

Google Book was accused of scanning 18,000 books by 570 Chinese writers without paying or noticing, as a part of its plan to set up a digital library in November.

The Chinese Writers' Association said last Sunday it received a letter from Google acknowledging its efforts had upset Chinese authors.

"Following discussions and communications in recent months, we do believe that our communication with Chinese writers has not been good enough," Google said in the scanned letter posted on the association's Web site.

"Google is ready to apologize to Chinese writers about this," said the letter, which bore the signature of Erik Hartmann, Asia-Pacific head of Google Books, also negotiator for the dispute in China.