FBI Probing Russian 'Spy Recruitment Centre'

The FBI is probing possible espionage at a Russian cultural exchange institute in Washington - a claim Moscow has denied.

The FBI is looking into whether Yuriy Zaytsev, the head of the government-run Russian Centre for Science and Culture, tried to recruit young Americans as intelligence assets, according to US officials cited by the AP news agency and other reports.

The Russian Foreign Ministry said it was "bewildered" by the reports and said the "fabrications they contained had nothing to do with the reality".

It demanded that the US government "unequivocally and publicly disavow the ill-intended attempts to cast a shadow on the activities of the Russian Centre for Science and Culture".

Mr Zaytsev dismissed the accusations as an attempt to hurt ties between Moscow and Washington.

"It's a shame that echoes of the Cold War are heard in Russian-American relations from time to time," the Russia news agency Itar-Tass quoted him as saying.

Anna Chapman was among Russian agents exposed in the US in 2010

The American magazine Mother Jones, which first reported the story, said the centre run by Mr Zaytsev had footed the bill for about 130 Americans to visit Russia.

The centre offers language lessons and cultural activities. The magazine said Mr Zaytsev or his associates had built files on participants, including one who had been an adviser to a US state governor.

The magazine said FBI agents have been interviewing Americans who participated in the programme.

US-Russian ties have been strained recently over differences on Syria, Moscow's decision to give refuge to former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden and the Kremlin's crackdown on the opposition and rights activists.

A flurry of spy cases has added to the tension.

In May, Russian security services arrested a US diplomat who they say was caught red-handed while trying to court a spy. He left the country a few days later.

In 2010, the FBI busted a ring of sleeper agents for Russia that it had been following for years in the United States.

All 10, including the now well-known Anna Chapman, pleaded guilty and were returned in a swap.

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