President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday that allegations that Russia had meddled in last year’s US presidential election were based on rumours and that Moscow did not want foreign powers to interfere in Russian politics. “We never interfere in the political life and the political processes of other countries and we don’t want anybody interfering in our political life and foreign policy processes,” said Putin. The Russian leader said foreign powers had tried to meddle in Russian politics many times in recent years however, including through non-governmental organisations. Merkel said she was not fearful of Russian meddling in German polls. “We know cyber criminality is an international challenge .. but we expect that the German election will go ahead unharmed and that we have enough different positions to tackle a range of topics,” she said.

Source: Hindustan Times May 02, 2017 14:26 UTC