Piracy is damaging Russia's exports, Mr Vershbow has said

Alexander Vershbow, writing in the Moscow Times, said the level of fake CDs and DVDs produced had given it a reputation as being soft on piracy.

He said Russians saw piracy as only taking money away from Western studios, which they did not view as a crime.

But he added creative talent in Russia was being badly hit by the problem.

Mr Vershbow said he had spoken to Russian musicians and asked them how he could buy their music on CD.

"Sadly, the overwhelming response has been that it is simply not profitable to record their works in Russia due to current piracy levels," he told the Moscow Times.

Mr Vershbow said that Russia was believed to produce more than 320 million pirated discs a year, and that more than 90% of them were exported.

Mr Vershbow (right) is a keen musician

He said the problem was also acute in the computing and software industries. He said: "Russia has a large pool of talented programmers and technical professionals, but the sector is also a victim of the pirates."

He said that Russia could become a major innovative country, if it could attract overseas investment. But he warned it was unlikely to do so unless it curbed piracy.

He said piracy was such a problem in Russia that the country was being seen as the "next China", saying that at one point China had 29 plants making pirated material.

"Russia is reported to have at least that many illegal plants operating now," Mr Vershbow said.

He said the pirated goods also hurt legitimate Russian exporters, saying that it undermined confidence in Russian industry.

He said that ordinary Russians were being hurt because a law-abiding company could not grow "while the pirates bleed away its funding".