CNN Airs Russian State TV Clip Claiming Election Meddling Indictments Blatant Attempt to Torpedo the Summit

On Sunday, CNN aired footage of Russian State television claiming that the indictment of 12 Russians for election meddling was actually an attempt to undermine the summit between President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Helsinki on Monday.

As translated by CNN, the narrator says in the clip:

“They are blatantly trying to torpedo the summit because there is no other way to explain why. On the eve of the summit, the U.S. announced charges against 12 Russians who allegedly participated in the interference in the U.S. Elections. In an instant, you could hear the cries to cancel the Trump/Putin meeting, but the meeting is crucial for the whole world more than ever before. The European political heavyweights are sure of it.”

Prior to playing the clip, CNN’s Senior International Correspondent Frederick Pleitgen noted, “the Russians were taking a very similar line to President Trump.”

“That’s Russian TV,” Pleitgen added after the clip.”That’s something that you hear very similar from them a lot of the time.”

The CNN correspondent continued on: “They think President Trump wants better relations but others are holding him back. In the run-up to the summit, I think they believe that they are in the driver’s seat right now because they think that the Americans are the ones that are coming to them. They had President Trump talk about wanting to meet Vladimir Putin. They had John Bolton go over to Russia to try and set things up. President Trump is already here waiting for Vladimir Putin, who at some point will come in. So they clearly believe that they are the ones who have very little to lose.”

Watch above,  via CNN

[image via screengrab]

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