White House: Trump has warned Russia not to interfere in US elections

At a meeting of the President with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, he warned Moscow of interference in next year's presidential election, and also urged her to resolve her crisis with Ukraine. In the meantime, last month it was reported that Russia is making efforts to impose Ukraine on Moscow's involvement in the 2016 election

White House: Trump has warned Russia not to interfere in US elections

US President Donald Trump on Tuesday warned Russia not to interfere in the US presidential election next year, a White House statement said. The President said this at a meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, attended by his American counterpart, Mike Pompeo. In addition, Trump implored Russia to resolve its conflict with Ukraine, stressing to Lavrov his support for global arms trade oversight, which includes not only Russia but China as well, the White House statement said.

Meanwhile, the New York Times reported last month that US intelligence officials for some senators had been investing efforts in recent years to place Ukraine in charge of Moscow's involvement in the 2016 US presidential election. Three US intelligence sources told the newspaper that Moscow's effort to incriminate Kiev in electoral intervention is part of a complex campaign aimed at undermining Ukrainian government stability and disseminating much information to influence US political discourse on the previous presidential race.

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Warned Russia not to interfere in the 2020 elections. Trump and Putin at the Helsinki Summit, 2018 (Photo: Reuters)

US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin during a Summit in Helsinki, Finland July 16, 2018 (Photo: Reuters)

According to the report, Moscow's current campaign uses a network of intelligence agents who pour disinformation to create the impression that Ukraine, rather than Russia, is the one who interfered in the race between Trump and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. The false information goes from agents to intermediaries, including oligarchs and businessmen, and from there to American political parties and even to some journalists, who probably do not know the source of the substances.

The report was made public when Republicans in the Republic defended Trump's demand from Ukraine to investigate whether the 2016 election interference was born, an issue he repeatedly raised with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zalansky. However, Fiona Hill, a former White House senior expert on Russian affairs, scolded Republicans for embracing conspiracy theory, saying that promoting the idea eventually helped Moscow.

"Based on the questions and statements I have heard, some of you on this committee seem to believe that Russia and its security services have not campaigned against our country - and maybe for some reason Ukraine did," Hill said at a hearing on the intelligence committee last Thursday. "This is a fictional narrative devised by Russian security services and distributed by them. During this investigation, I ask you not to advance lies from political motives that so clearly promote Russian interests."

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Trump and Lavrov at their 2017 meeting (Photo: AP)

US President Donald Trump with Russian Ambassador Sergei Kislyak and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, May 16, 2017 (Photo: AP)

President Trump has previously been suspected of allowing Russian intervention in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, suspicions that have been the subject of an investigation for two years. Last July, Special Investigator Robert Mueller testified in two separate hearings before Congress, drawing his conclusions. According to Muller's investigative report: Trump is not yet acquitted of suspicion of disrupting an investigation, an incumbent president cannot be prosecuted, nor is there any basis for the Trump campaign to contact Russia in the presidential election. He even warned that Russia continues to interfere in American politics and criticized Trump's accolades over Wikileaks during the campaign.

"The investigation found no evidence that there was collusion between Trump's campaign and Russia," Muller said in his remarks to the House Judiciary Committee. However, Muller emphasized that Russia intervened in an election campaign in 2016 in a "widespread and systematic" manner.