Washington has denied reports that it was abandoning a plan to deploy defense missile shield bases in Poland and the Czech Republic.

"I would call that report inaccurate," the US State Department Spokesman P.J. Crowley told reporters. "Our review of our missile defense strategy is ongoing and has not reached completion yet."

Leading Polish daily Gazeta Wyborcza, citing officials and lobbyists in Washington, said the United States was scrapping plans to build the bases in Poland and the Czech Republic and was looking at alternatives including Israel and Turkey.

Former US president George W. Bush's administration devised the missile defense plan, saying that it was a precautionary measure against attacks from the so called 'rogue states' like Iran and North Korea.

During his visit to Bulgaria in June 2007 George Bush held talks with the country's government, a staunch US ally, which was concerned it may be left out of the plan, which would include bases in Poland and the Czech Republic.

The issue has contributed to raised tensions between the US and Russia, which responded furiously to what it saw as an encroachment in the former Soviet bloc and threatened to deploy its own missile system in Kaliningrad, an exclave near Poland.

Bush's successor President Barack Obama, who has tried to "reset" relations with Russia, launched a review of the controversial system after taking office earlier this year.