TEHRAN The U.S. House of Representatives, outraged at the United States having lost its seat on the UN's human rights panel, on Thursday voted to condition its final arrears payment to the world body on regaining its position on the commission.

The measure, which passed 252 in favor to 165 against, conditionally withholds U.S. arrears payments of some 244 million dollars, but releases pledged payments of 582 million dollars for this year.

With the ratification, the U.S. Congress showed that it intends to gain power by any means, including money. If the U.S. Senate approves such a bill, it means that the country is trying to buy its seat in the human rights body by threatening the UN Organization.

United Nations spokesman Fred Eckhard expressed relief that the House decision would not take immediate effect, AFP reported from Washington. "If there is time for that next vote to come up a year from now, we are a little less concerned than we would be if there were conditions attached" to the money due this year, Eckhard said.

The vote reflects U.S. lawmakers' anger that the United States polled last out of four candidates in a secret ballot for the UN Human Rights Commission last Thursday, despite international pledges of support.

"I don't like our UN diplomats walking around with a sign on their backs saying 'Kick Me,' and we're trying to take that sign down," said Congressman Henry Hyde, chairman of the House International Relations Committee.

But Secretary of State Colin Powell lamented the decision. "We didn't support it, we didn't feel it was the right approach," Powell told reporters following passage of the measure, that he said he hoped would not be adopted by the Senate.

Legislators passed the measure despite calls from both the White House and State Department not to link the two issues.

"The administration believes strongly that any attempt to link U.S. payments to the United Nations -- now or in the future -- to U.S. membership or support for the commission on human rights is counterproductive," said David Welch, assistant secretary for international organization affairs at the State Department.

"Not only will withholding money compound the problem of resentment toward the U.S. in the UN and provide ammunition to our adversaries, it will also frustrate our efforts to further U.S. political interests and push for reform of the institution and its agencies," he said prior to the vote.

Hyde, who cosponsored the amendment, insisted the vote had been effective, giving "members an opportunity to express their dismay and disgust" at the UN ballot outcome. "We want to give (the United Nations) pause for thought."

A vote is taken every year in the UN Rights Commission to renew about one-third of the 53 members. Some here believe this year's surprise vote removing the United States from the panel was partly in retaliation to certain controversial Washington policies.

Meanwhile in another development, Moscow announced that the United States failed to convince Russia of the need to deploy its planned missile defense shield during high-level talks Friday in Moscow.

The Russian Foreign Ministry's Spokesman Alexander Yakovenko told journalists after the two hours of discussions, "It looks like the American side did not provide adequate arguments for scrapping the international security system of the past 30 years."

According to AFP, led by Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, an 18-strong delegation is in Moscow on the last leg of a tour of European capitals to explain Washington's plan to set up a 60-billion-dollar system to intercept missiles.

The Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman said the discussions had a "substantive character" but added that "so far there are more questions than answers."

Wolfowitz's spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Paul Phillips earlier emerged half-way through the talks to say that the U.S. side had presented the MD plan in the same way as done elsewhere in Europe.

"The meeting started with the Americans giving their presentation and the Russians after an hour had not responded," he told reporters.