NEW YORK, June 16. /TASS/. No country is capable of affecting the outcome of presidential elections in the United States, Russian President Vladimir Putin said in the fourth and final episode of The Putin Interviews documentary, aired in the United States on Thursday night.
"We have never engaged in any cyber attack," the Russian leader said. "It is hard to imagine any other side, even a country like Russia, of being able to seriously influence the election campaign and its results."
"One security service speaks about a high degree of certainty of the possibility of Russia’s interference. The other says the degree of certainty is not that high. Their conclusions are based on the analysis of the situation, but nothing certain," Putin went on.
He said that to him, the anti-Russian hysteria in the United States was similar to "prejudices against certain ethnic groups, for example, anti-Semitism."
"Anti-Semites always blame the Jews for their own faults. There are people who have the same feeling toward Russia. For them, Russia is always to blame," Putin said.
He said that certain forces turned anti-Russian speculations into an instrument of internal political struggle, adding that the constant speculation on the issue is intended to achieve three goals.
"At the moment, this is done for several reasons: to undermine the legitimacy of President Trump; to create conditions that will diminish the opportunity to normalize relations and simply to create instruments for internal political struggle. In this context, the Russian-US relations are simply an instrument of political infighting in the US," he said.
The Russian leader added that the US side ignored Russia’s proposal to create a set of rules regulating cyberspace, made in 2015.