MOSCOW -- Russia weighed its response on Sunday to a sharp U.S. rebuke for alleged indiscriminate bombing in northern Georgia, a move Washington said could fuel tensions in the turbulent Caucasus region.

Georgia said one man was killed and seven people wounded in Friday's attack, which White House Spokesman Ari Fleischer said had been verified by monitors from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.

"The United States regrets this loss of life and deplores the violation of Georgia's sovereignty," Fleischer said on Saturday. However, he quickly stressed his statement did not signal any deterioration in U.S.-Russian relations.

Such official public upbraidings have become comparatively rare as Russian-U.S. ties blossomed following Moscow's strong support for Washington's so-called "war on terrorism" launched after the September 11 hijacked airliner attacks in New York and Washington, which left more than 3,000 people dead. The Russian military again denied on Sunday its aircraft had bombed the zone. Defense Ministry chief spokesman Colonel Nikolai Deryabin told Interfax news agency that reports to the contrary "can only cause surprise."

A duty spokesman told Reuters that senior officials at the Foreign Ministry was considering its response to the criticism.

"They are currently studying Fleischer's comments, but it's not clear if there will be a statement or not. We can make no comment at the moment", the official said. The Kremlin also declined to comment.

The Russian warplanes struck close to the lawless Pankisi gorge, which the United States believes could be a refuge for militant Islamists. The gorge also lies across the border from Chechnya where Russian forces have been battling separatist guerrillas on and off for eight years.

Fleischer said the United States was "deeply concerned about credible reports that Russian military aircraft indiscriminately bombed villages in northern Georgia on August 23, resulting in the killing of civilians".

The attacks "escalate existing tension between Russia and Georgia", he said, adding that Secretary of State Colin Powell had relayed U.S. concerns directly to his Russian counterpart, and stressed that a political settlement to the conflict in Russia's rebel Chechnya province was needed "urgently".

In Tbilisi, Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze said on state television that "the main thing is that the White House has reflected the real barbarity of this act".

Relations between Russia and Georgia have hit new lows in the past week as Moscow accused Georgia of turning a blind eye to Chechen guerrillas in Pankisi and refusing to hand over rebels arrested by Georgian forces.

Georgia rejects demands for Russian troops to be allowed into the gorge and Shevardnadze announced he had ordered his Interior Ministry forces into the gorge on Sunday as part of a crackdown on crime there.

At the same time, U.S.-trained Georgian troops launched large-scale war games at an official ceremony near Pichkhovani, a village around four km (two miles) from the Pankisi gorge.

"The army is not taking part in a police operation, but it is creating the conditions for the police to do their job better," Georgian Defense Minister David Tevzadze told Reuters.