Russia tests long-range 'stealth' nuclear missile as Putin accuses U.S. of causing Georgia conflict

Russia has tested a long-range 'stealth' missile as it faces the threat of EU sanctions.

In what was seen as a calculated show of strength, the Kremlin announced it had successfully launched a Topol rocket, which has a range of 6,125 miles and can carry one 550-kiloton warhead - putting Europe and much of the US within reach.

'The experimental warhead section of the rocket hit its pre-determined target with high accuracy at the firing range on the Kamchatka peninsula,' Interfax news agency quoted a Russian military spokesman as saying.

Western officials believed the test was deliberately staged to capitalise on the rising tensions between East and West over the crisis in Georgia.

It came as the European Union warned that it would consider trade and travel restrictions against Russia when its 27 leaders meet on Monday.

Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said they were trying 'to elaborate a strong text' to show determination not to accept what is happening in Georgia.

'Of course, there are also sanctions. They will certainly be suggested.'

Moscow immediately dismissed the threat as the product of a 'sick imagination'.

Since Europe is heavily dependent on Russian energy supplies, a trade war is highly unlikely.

But Foreign Secretary David Miliband warned that the 'relative and growing calm' of the post-Soviet era is at an end.

Mr Miliband said there is no question of 'all-out war' with Russia, but insisted that Georgia's 'territorial integrity' had been violated in the skirmish over its Russian-backed separatist regions.

He spoke as the US attacked 'patently false' claims by Vladimir Putin that Washington instigated the war in Georgia.

Russian Topol inter-continental ballistic missiles are pictured during a rehearsal for the nation's annual May 9 Victory Day parade (file photo)

Accusation: Vladimir Putin speaks out against the US in a CNN interview

The White House hit back after the Russian prime minister said the conflict was driven by the presence of American citizens in the region.

Mr Putin suggested in an interview with CNN that there was a US presence amid the combat and that President George Bush stoked the conflict to help underline John McCain's hawkish credentials in the election race.

'We have serious grounds to think there were US citizens in the combat zone' during Russia's war with the ex-Soviet republic, he said.

'It raises the suspicion that somebody in the US purposefully created this conflict with the aim of creating an advantage ... for one of the candidates in the battle for the post of US president.'

He even hinted the US had helped Georgian troops 'murder' civilians in South Ossetia.

'Why hold years of difficult talks and seek complex compromises in interethnic conflicts? It's easier to arm one side and push it into the murder-of the other side,' he said.

Moscow claimed tensions have been heightened by a Nato naval build-up in the Black Sea, with the US sending a Sixth Fleet flagship carrying 'humanitarian aid' - though Russian president Dmitry Medvedev claims the ships are carrying weapons.

Senior Russian General Anatoly Nagovitsyn claimed British mine-clearance charity Halo Trust was training bomb technicians in the Georgian army.

White House press secretary Dana Perino called Mr Putin's contentions 'patently false' and 'not rational'.

The UN today criticised Russia's allies in South Ossetia, claiming militiamen had beaten elderly Georgians and forced them out of their homes.

In an interview with a French TV station screened today, Georgian president Mikhail Saakashvili said the conflict had nothing to do with the US but was down to 'the aggression of the Russians'.

Bone of contention: A pallet is off-loaded from the US Coast Guard cutter Dallas in the port of Batumi, Georgia

Ms Perino said Russia is facing the consequences of a diminished global reputation and that 'there will be other' consequences as well.

US firms Boeing, Microsoft and General Electric are nervous their £10billion-ayear trade with Russia may suffer.

Trade between the two countries has grown, with Russian exports to the US hitting $19.4billion last year.

'The European government and our own government are weighing options,' said Mike Considine, director for Eurasian Affairs at the US Chamber of Commerce.

The Group of Seven rich nations condemned Moscow's 'continued occupation of Georgia' while a group of Asian allies led by China, meeting at a regional summit, failed to follow Russia's lead on independence for two breakaway regions of Georgia.

Belarus, Russia's closest ex-Soviet ally, gave the clearest support, with President Alexander Lukashenko saying the Kremlin 'had no other moral choice' but to recognise the Georgian regions. But he too stopped short of recognising them himself.