Russian Says U.S. Not Paying for Uranium : Arms: Official declares American firm has ‘bamboozled’ Moscow. Company’s president cites restrictive regulations.

Russia’s atomic energy minister accused the United States on Tuesday of reneging on a crucial post-Cold War agreement to help finance Russian nuclear disarmament by buying recycled uranium from dismantled warheads.

Viktor N. Mikhailov asserted that the U.S. Enrichment Corp. of Bethesda, Md., a company formed by the American government to buy 500 tons of weapons-grade uranium from Russia and sell it as nuclear reactor fuel, has “bamboozled” Russia by withholding one-third of the promised payment.

In an interview, he threatened to cut off uranium sales to the United States next year and find other markets for Russia’s atomic materiel if the dispute over pricing and contract terms is not resolved soon. “I tell them, ‘Excuse me, this is robbery in broad daylight,’ ” Mikhailov said bitterly. “We do not need such a contract.”

The prospect of the collapse of the uranium deal set off alarm bells in Washington, where U.S. officials said the disarmament accord--with a total value of $12 billion--remains a top priority and must be put back on track.

Mikhailov’s scathing remarks Tuesday came as U.S. Enrichment Corp. President William H. Timbers Jr., testifying before the Senate Energy Committee, said U.S. legal restrictions could prevent the company from paying Moscow the money it expects before the year 2014. Timbers warned that any U.S. failure to pay could threaten “one of the most important peace initiatives of the post-Cold War era.”

But Charles Curtis, an Energy Department undersecretary, said the Clinton Administration does not believe that the uranium agreement is in jeopardy and hopes to work out a solution by June 29, when Vice President Al Gore is to visit Moscow.

Mikhailov, the architect of a much-disputed deal to sell Russian nuclear technology to Iran, is controversial in the West. Some view him as a rogue operator who is unburdened by the need for public accountability yet heads a vast, still-secretive post-Soviet atomic empire.

Despite concern in Washington over Russia’s commercial nuclear intent, U.S. officials see the weapons-to-fuel program as good for the United States. They said it finances Russian disarmament and does away with weapons-grade uranium stockpiles at no cost to U.S. taxpayers.

The agreement was negotiated in 1992 by then-President George Bush and expanded into a contract by President Clinton and Russian President Boris N. Yeltsin at a 1993 summit in Vancouver, Canada.

Mikhailov said he had wanted $800 per kilogram (2.2 pounds) of uranium but that Clinton and Yeltsin agreed on a price of $780. But he said that U.S. Enrichment Corp. is now trying to push the price down to $600 or $650.

The first 30 tons of uranium are being delivered to the United States under a deal that should give Russia $600 million a year, Mikhailov said. As agreed, Russia has taken 90% enriched, bomb-quality uranium-235, diluted it with uranium ore until it reaches the U.S. standard of 4.4% enrichment and shipped it to the West, Mikhailov said. U.S. Enrichment Corp. is to fashion the Russian uranium into nuclear reactor fuel and sell it to commercial power plants.

The corporation had agreed to pay for two-thirds of the uranium up front and the balance only after it resold the nuclear fuel. But anti-dumping restrictions aimed at keeping Russian uranium from flooding markets have prohibited it from selling the fuel, Timbers said in written testimony. He asked Congress to approve revised legislation to let Russia be paid promptly for any uranium it ships.

Barbara Arnold, a corporation spokeswoman, said the first shipment of Russian uranium is still en route and is to arrive in the United States later this month. In the meantime, she said, the Administration intends to propose its own legislation aimed at correcting problems.

Mikhailov said the failure to pay for uranium already on its way amounts to the United States freezing Russia’s legitimate earnings at a time when cash-strapped Moscow is begging international lenders for more credit.

If the United States fails to make good on the agreement, he said, Russia will seek other markets, including China, Iran, India, Indonesia, Brazil, South Korea and Japan.

He said he believes the U.S. government erred by entrusting a private company to handle a contract so sensitive to its foreign policy. “I do not understand why the United States is putting the fate of disarmament into the hands of a semiprivate company,” he said, charging that the State Department has sided with the corporation.