US President Donald Trump has denied he knew about a meeting between his aides and a Russian delegation that offered to help him win the 2016 election.
Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen has claimed he was present when the president’s eldest son, Donald Trump Jr, told his father about the meeting.
Cohen appears to now be cooperating with Robert Mueller’s inquiry into Russian interference in the 2016 US presidential election.
Meanwhile, Vladimir Putin said on Friday he had invited Trump to visit Moscow and was ready to travel to Washington, seeking to put on a brave face after the US delayed a new summit with the Kremlin chief to next year.
Speaking after the Helsinki summit with Trump sparked a political crisis in the United States, Putin said the two leaders planned to meet on the sidelines of a summit in Argentina later this year and possibly at other venues.
“I am ready to go to Washington,” Putin told reporters following a summit of the leaders of the BRICS group — Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa — in Johannesburg, adding that he had also invited Trump to visit Moscow.
“(Trump) has a desire to conduct meetings in the future and I am ready,” Putin said, stressing, however, that conditions should be in place for such events to go ahead.
The Kremlin chief spoke after the US administration earlier this week delayed a second summit between Putin and Trump to next year under fire from critics at home and was visibly at pains to demonstrate he had taken no offence.
He said he understood the US leader’s position, adding they planned to meet on the sidelines of a G-20 meeting in Buenos Aires starting late November. Trump and Putin could also meet at other international events, the Russian leader said without naming them.
“Life goes on and our contacts are continuing despite all the difficulties — the difficulties in the US domestic political life,” Putin said.
He said the two leaders needed to see each other face-to-face to discuss a host of bilateral and international issues like Syria, Iran and nuclear arms control.
He said talks should begin on the possible extension of a nuclear arms treaty which was signed by Trump and Putin’s predecessors, Barack Obama and Dmitry Medvedev in 2010 and which will expire in 2021. “Are we going to extend it or not?” he asked. “Contacts at the highest political level are needed,” Putin said. “You cannot discuss everything by phone.”
The summit between the US and Russian leaders in the Finnish capital this month unleashed political turmoil in Washington, with some critics accusing the US president of betraying America’s interests.
Trump faced particularly intense criticism after the news conference, during which he appeared to support Putin’s “extremely strong and powerful” denial of subverting the 2016 US presidential election. In South Africa, Putin also said “political disputes” were damaging the dollar as a reserve currency, speaking shortly after Moscow exited the list of the biggest foreign holders of US government debt. — AP