FILE PHOTO: Russia's President Vladimir Putin speaks at a meeting of the Valdai Discussion Club via a video conference call at the Novo-Ogaryovo state residence outside Moscow, Russia October 22, 2020. Sputnik/Alexei Druzhinin/Kremlin via REUTERS
MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Sunday that he saw nothing criminal in Hunter Biden’s past business ties with Ukraine or Russia, marking out his disagreement with one of Donald Trump’s attack lines in the U.S. presidential election.
Putin was responding to comments made by Trump during televised debates with Democratic challenger Joe Biden ahead of the Nov. 3 election.
Trump, who is trailing in opinion polls, has used the debates to make accusations that Biden and his son Hunter engaged in unethical practices in Ukraine. No evidence has been verified to support the allegations, and Joe Biden has called them false and discredited.
Putin, who has praised Trump in the past for saying he wanted better ties with Moscow, has said Russia will work with any U.S. leader, while noting what he called Joe Biden’s “sharp anti-Russian rhetoric”.
Putin appeared less friendly towards Trump in remarks broadcast by Russian state TV on Sunday. In what may be seen by some analysts as an attempt to try to curry favour with the Biden camp, he took the time to knock down what he made clear he regarded as false allegations from Trump about the Bidens.
“Yes, in Ukraine he (Hunter Biden) had or maybe still has a business, I don’t know. It doesn’t concern us. It concerns the Americans and the Ukrainians,” said Putin.
“But well yes he had at least one company, which he practically headed up, and judging from everything he made good money. I don’t see anything criminal about this, at least we don’t know anything about this (being criminal).”
Putin also reacted with visible irritation when asked about comments Trump has made concerning Putin’s ties to the former mayor of Moscow, and to an alleged payment made to Hunter Biden by the ex-mayor’s widow. Putin said he knew nothing about the existence of any commercial relationship between Hunter and the woman. Joe Biden says the accusation about his son is not true.
U.S. intelligence agencies concluded that Russia tried to interfere in the 2016 U.S. presidential election to tilt the contest in Trump’s favour, an allegation Moscow has denied. Russia has also dismissed accusations by U.S. intelligence agencies of trying to interfere with this year’s election too.
LtLatency on October 26th, 2020 at 03:31 UTC »
The title is very misleading.
Putin says "Biden had a at least one company that made a lot of money but he doesn't know about anything illegal happening because it doesn't concern Russia so it an america Ukraine topic"
So he not rejecting anything he just saying he doesn't know anything about the topic
PWEI on October 26th, 2020 at 02:41 UTC »
This is starting to feel like Arrested Development.
This is all smoke and mirrors.
GabryalSansclair on October 25th, 2020 at 23:59 UTC »
I'll admit that I admire Putin a little bit for his absolute dedication to ratfucking the world. He's like a world killing asteroid developed a personality and was raised entirely in environments made of sheet metal and gulag grey, grew up to run a country with nukes. He's a modern horseman of the apocalypse