Russian
President Vladimir Putin on Monday described the probe by Special Counsel
Robert Mueller into Moscow’s election meddling as “political games” that should
not
be permitted to interfere with US-Russia relations.
Asked in a
Fox News interview about Mueller’s indictment Friday of 12 Russian intelligence
agents for hacking Democratic Party computers in 2016, just three days before
his summit with President Donald Trump, Putin said it was not his concern, but
rather part of an “internal political struggle.”
“I’m not
interested in this issue a single bit,” he said, speaking through a translator.
“It’s the
internal political games of the United States.”
“Don’t make
the relationship between Russia and the United States, don’t hold it hostage of
this internal political struggle,” Putin said.
Putin was
speaking shortly after his summit with Trump in Helsinki, Finland on Monday,
where the question of alleged Russian interference in the 2016 presidential
race loomed large.
His response
echoed Trump’s stance on the Mueller probe, which is digging into possible
collusion between Trump’s campaign and Moscow.
Trump has
repeatedly branded the Mueller probe a “witch hunt”.
And in a
press conference Monday with Putin at his side, Trump dismissed his own
intelligence chiefs’ conclusion that Putin himself oversaw the effort to damage
Trump’s Democratic election rival Hillary Clinton.
Putin
suggested Monday, like Trump has done repeatedly, that Mueller’s appointment as
an independent prosecutor to pursue the investigation lacks legitimacy.
“It’s quite
clear to me that this is just an internal political struggle and it’s nothing
to be proud of for American democracy to use such dirty methods and political
rivalry,” Putin told Fox.
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