WASHINGTON (States News Service) -- NASA made an "extremely serious" mistake in not following State Department guidelines when working with Russian biotechnology institutes that had once been a part of the Soviet germ-warfare program, an internal space agency report released earlier this month said.

The report, conducted by NASA's inspector general, was spurred by a January article in The New York Times claiming that NASA funding intended for Russian space research was instead diverted to Biopreparat, a Russian organization that once led the Soviet Union's biological weapons research program.

Biopreparat is now a state-owned drug company, but the NASA report says that its "continued role in biological warfare research is also unclear."

Sensenbrenner sharply criticized NASA's "lack of vigilance" after a damning report revealed the space agency worked with Russian biotechnology institutes that had once been part of the Soviet germ-warfare program.

NASA first began to fund Biopreparat and five institutes affiliated with it in 1994 as part of a $20 million program to maintain Russian space research after the fall of the Soviet Union.

According to the inspector general's report, roughly $1.24 million of the NASA funds made its way to Biopreparat and the five former germ-warfare centers.

NASA became suspicious of the connection between its dollars and chemical-weapons research in 1995, when Russian scientists told a visiting delegation of space agency officials that the Biopreparat-affiliated centers were involved in producing biologically based drugs, the report says.

After that tour, NASA received confirmation from the State Department that the institutes receiving space agency money were connected with the biological warfare program, but the department did not ask NASA to stop working with the centers, according to the report.

That fall, however, a division of the State Department told NASA that it should have a representative in Russia to oversee key experiments funded by the space agency and to ensure that results reported by the Russian scientists were accurate.

The State Department also asked NASA to carefully scrutinize Russian proposals for funding before approving the projects.

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According to the inspector general's report, NASA failed to adhere to the State Department's guidelines, an oversight that the report labeled an "extremely serious misstep."

The report points to three projects at former Soviet biological warfare centers that NASA funded without reviewing the proposals. "NASA exercised very little influence over which research projects in the space biotechnology discipline were selected," the report's authors wrote.

NASA also failed to follow the State Department's calls for a Russia-based observer and site visits. The space agency did not have American scientists for any of the Russian institutes' key experiments and only scheduled two brief visits to the former Soviet germ-warfare centers, the report said.

"This report by the NASA inspector general confirms that taxpayer funds entrusted to NASA ended up in the hands of Russian scientists engaged in researching the development of biological weapons. NASA's lack of vigilance is unforgivable."

During the inspector general's investigation, NASA officials said that they did not send observers to the Russian centers because it was not cost-efficient and because the space agency hoped to spur the Russian space effort to independence.

The inspector general's report called on NASA to closely coordinate with the State Department all future space agency programs that fund foreign scientists and to require on-site inspections of foreign centers that are believed to work on biological weapons.

In a memorandum to the inspector general's office, two top NASA officials largely accepted the report's findings and recommendation.

"NASA practices due diligence with respect to the proper execution of international activities and works closely with the Department of State and other executive branch agencies to ensure appropriate consultation [and] compliance," NASA Chief Scientist Kathie L. Olsen and Associate Administrator for External Affairs John D. Schumacher wrote.

NASA spokesman Dwayne Brown said that NASA's office of external relations was updating the space agency's procedures for working with the State Department and American intelligence groups.

Those procedures could include regular meetings among the agencies or some other form of direct link, he said.

He said that NASA is no longer involved with the Russian biotechnology institutes because the program ended in the late 1990s.

The inspector general's report sparked the outrage of Rep. F. James Sensenbrenner (R-Wisconsin), chairman of the House Science Committee and one of NASA's most vocal critics.

"This report by the NASA inspector general confirms that taxpayer funds entrusted to NASA ended up in the hands of Russian scientists engaged in researching the development of biological weapons," he said in a statement.

"NASA's lack of vigilance is unforgivable."