U.S. President Donald Trump said in a television interview that he believes Russian President Vladimir Putin “probably” has been involved in assassinations and reiterated the assertion that Moscow meddled in U.S. politics, RFERL reports.
Trump also said he does not know whether U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis is planning to step down but that he sees the four-star general as “sort of a Democrat” who just might leave.
The comments came in a prerecorded interview with CBS television’s 60 Minutes program that aired on October 14. The wide-ranging discussion also touched on North Korea, U.S. hurricane relief efforts, the missing Saudi journalist in Turkey, and climate change.
When CBS presenter Lesley Stahl asked Trump whether he agrees with people who claim that Putin has been involved in the assassination of critics, Trump replied, “Probably he is, yeah. Probably.”
It was not immediately clear what assassinations Trump suspected Putin of being involved in, although many critics of the Russian leader have been killed through suspected poisonings and others in mysterious circumstances.
Moscow has denied any connections.
Asked about Russian interference in the U.S. political system, Trump said he believes that Moscow did meddle, but he added that “China meddled, too.”
“You are diverting the whole Russia thing,” Stahl told the president.
“I’m not doing anything,” Trump replied.
The U.S. intelligence community and a U.S. special counsel have concluded that Russia used a campaign of spreading propaganda on social media and hacking Democratic documents to try to influence the 2016 U.S. presidential election in Trump’s favor.
Moscow denies any meddling.
Photo – RFERL