Putin and Bush start exchanging scathing remarks again

The department's official spokesman, Sean McCormack, had the same message: "Our message was very, very clear, and there should be no mistaking this: that this was a decision entirely for the OSCE. Whatever they decided, whether to send the mission or not to send the mission, that was going to be entirely up to them.

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The OSCE election monitoring office announced its decision on Nov. 16 not to send an observer mission to monitor Russia's election because Moscow had taken too long to issue visas and had created other obstacles including restricting the size of the mission to 70 people. Far more observers would have been needed, it said.

"This was not about United States, it was not about U.S.-Russia relations; it was about Russia and its elections," Fried told The Associated Press.

In another development, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov met privately at the State Department Monday before a meeting of the so-called Quartet working to bring an Israeli-Palestinian settlement in the Middle East. Russia and the United States are joined in the Quartet by the European Union and the United Nations.

Asked whether Rice would raise the Putin-OSCE issue with Lavrov, Fried said he did not know, but "she knows about it."

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