U.S. Quarrel With Russia Heats Up

A dispute between the United States and Russia over Iranian nuclear projects escalated sharply Thursday, with the Russian secret service accusing Washington of bias and suggesting that it is getting its facts wrong.

The State Department raised the stakes in the dispute Wednesday, threatening to cancel lucrative satellite launch contracts unless Russia takes more decisive steps to prevent Iran from developing the ability to build a nuclear bomb. The threat followed an announcement earlier in the week by the U.S. that it was imposing sanctions on three Russian science institutes for allegedly assisting the Iranian program.

The U.S. actions have unleashed a flood of anti-American feeling in Russia and threaten to sour the atmosphere when Secretary of State Madeleine Albright visits Moscow at the end of the month.

“I won’t call it blackmail, but it’s a sort of political caprice, political pressure, not a serious attempt at preventing proliferation,” said Alexei G. Arbatov, a liberal member of parliament’s lower house and deputy chairman of its defense committee.

Russia’s usually taciturn Federal Security Service, the main successor to the Soviet-era KGB, issued an unusual statement saying it had investigated the U.S. charges and found them groundless.

“Those organizations have committed no violation of international export-control rules intended to bar proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and missile technology,” the statement said, according to Russian news agencies.

“The sanctions demonstrate the American side’s biased attitude toward cooperation by Russian state organizations with foreign countries, including the Islamic Republic of Iran,” the statement continued. “We hope this is a misunderstanding or, perhaps, a mistake by American secret services.”

The Kremlin said President Boris N. Yeltsin instructed his advisors to prepare an “adequate response” to the United States.

“I don’t doubt it will be tough,” said Yeltsin’s spokesman, Dmitri D. Yakushkin.

Yeltsin, whose bouts of ill health have grown longer and more frequent, missed his first scheduled day of work since the New Year holiday and stayed out of sight at his country residence Thursday. In a radio interview, Yakushkin acknowledged that he has not seen the president since before the holiday but insisted that Yeltsin’s voice has been strong in their phone conversations.

“He has many meetings, a full work schedule,” Yakushkin said. “I want to warn journalists not to read too much into the change in his schedule.”

The United States and Russia have been at loggerheads for years over Russia’s construction of a nuclear power plant in the southern Iranian city of Bushehr. U.S. experts fear that the planned reactor eventually could be used to make weapons-grade nuclear fuel, but Russian scientists insist that it will only provide electricity.

“Russia will not commit suicide,” Yakushkin said. “Iran is our neighbor. We will not export anything to them that could someday cause danger to ourselves.”

But the United States remains convinced that Russian scientists traveling to Bushehr are consulting with Iran on nuclear technology that goes beyond civilian energy. According to sources who spoke on condition of anonymity, the United States has even shared its intelligence assessments with the Russian government several times in recent months in an effort to persuade Moscow to take firmer action to curb such contacts.

The new threat to cancel the launches of American satellites by Russia appears to have stirred more attention on the Russian side. While the sanctions announced earlier this week were largely symbolic, Russian officials say they have hundreds of millions of dollars riding on the launches.

“But U.S. companies will lose even more,” asserted Sergei K. Gromov, a spokesman for Energiya, a major rocket manufacturer.

“I don’t think [the United States] will go beyond this psychological warfare,” Gromov continued. “We are no longer the Soviet Union. Why should space companies suffer for the hypothetical sins of other institutions? What do space research rockets have in common with nuclear missiles? This is a very simplistic and superficial approach, and I hope it will be over before our economic ties sustain any real damage.”

The Bushehr project reflects diametrically opposed attitudes toward Iran. Russia considers Iran a moderate Islamic state and a longtime partner with whom cooperation is more effective than punishment. The United States, remembering the Iranian hostage crisis, doesn’t believe that Iran has proven itself a responsible member of the international community.

Russia and Iran say the Bushehr reactor will be monitored by the International Atomic Energy Agency. Agency spokesman David Kyd said IAEA oversight won’t begin on the ground until nuclear fuel actually arrives at the construction site, and that is still years in the future. The agency, however, already monitors several research facilities elsewhere in Iran.

Sergei L. Loiko of The Times’ Moscow Bureau contributed to this report.