Putin said it wasn’t important who conducted the hacking, but “what’s important is that there was material that was released to the public”. “But I want to tell you again, I don’t know anything about it, and on a state level Russian Federation has never done this”. He called the accusations against Russian Federation by USA officials and politicians an attempt to “distract the public’s attention”.
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A number of U.S. officials and media outlets accused Moscow of “trying to hack” the USA presidential election by using cyber-offensive operations that undermine Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton and benefiting her Republican rival Donald Trump.
“Iran is starting from a very low position, connected with the well-known sanctions in relation to this country”, Putin said in an interview with Bloomberg.
A computer network used by Clinton’s campaign, and the party’s fundraising committee for the U.S. House of Representatives were also hacked.
Putin’s view on Russia’s latest best friend, Iran, will not be sitting well with Iran’s regional archrival, Saudi Arabia, which is also OPEC’s top oil producer, with non-OPEC Russia sitting pretty as the world’s top producer.
He suggested his administration wasn’t savvy enough in the realm of American politics to think of attempting to influence the election.
Putin dismissed the allegations.
Mr Putin, on his part, said on Saturday that his country is ready to take decisive steps to resolve a seven-decade territorial dispute with Japan over a string of Pacific islands controlled by Russian Federation.
“That’s why we never intervened, don’t intervene and try not to intervene in domestic political processes” in the U.S. Putin said that he has no preference among the two major party candidates, but criticized them for playing “the anti-Russian card”. Trump, in return, has said Clinton’s own close ties to the Russian president deserve greater scrutiny.
“I hope to have a heart-to-heart talk with President Putin to move forward on the issue of a peace treaty and the Northern Territories”, Abe said, using the Japanese name for the islands, which in Russian are known as the Southern Kurile islands.
Hillary Clinton’s campaign staff has accused Putin of trying through the leaks to tilt the presidential race in favor of her opponent and has accused Trump of supporting policies friendly to the Russian government, noting his expressions of admiration for Putin.
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“At any rate, we definitely don’t do this at a state level”, he said.
