UPDATE: U.S. will not recall Adamov extradition request

GENEVA, September 2 (RIA Novosti, Yekaterina Andrianova) - The United States has not given up in its attempts to secure the extradition from Switzerland of a former Russian minister, a spokesman for Swiss Federal Department of Justice said Friday.

The U.S. Department of Justice notified Switzerland that it still wanted to see ex-Russian Nuclear Power Minister Yevgeny Adamov face embezzlement charges in America rather than in Russia, where he is also wanted.

"The response reads that the U.S. is insisting on its request to have Adamov extradited," spokesman Folco Galli said.

The Swiss Justice Department sent the relevant request to the U.S. after Adamov had agreed to be extradited to Russia August 25 and said the Russian authorities could also prosecute him for offenses with which he was charged in the U.S.

Adamov is in a Swiss prison, and the Swiss Federal Department of Justice will decide whose extradition request should be given a priority.

The department can consider this issue for as long as it believes it necessary. Moreover, Adamov's lawyers can appeal any resolution of the department in Switzerland's Federal Supreme Court in Lausanne.

The U.S. sent Switzerland an official request to have Adamov extradited on June 24. The U.S. authorities have charged Adamov and his business partner, U.S. citizen Mark Kaushansky, with embezzling $9 million the U.S. government gave Russia for nuclear security projects.

Russia sent a request to have the ex-minister extradited on May 17 three days after Moscow's Basmanny court issued an arrest warrant. The Prosecutor General's Office launched criminal proceedings against Adamov on charges of fraud and abuse of office.

Adamov who was nuclear power minister in 1998-2001 was arrested on May 2, 2005 in Bern on the request of the U.S. Justice Department.