MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 28th June, 2020) US President Donald Trump on Sunday denied media reports claiming that he was informed of but failed to act on a US intelligence report about Russian intelligence allegedly paying the Taliban in Afghanistan to kill US troops.
This past Friday, The New York Times published an article where it cited unnamed government sources as saying that Trump was presented with an intelligence report that claimed that Moscow could have payed bounty to armed Islamic insurgents in Afghanistan to assassinate US soldiers. The outlet criticized Trump for not having taken any appropriate action, and so did his key rival in the presidential race, former Vice President Joe Biden, in a statement on Saturday.
"Nobody briefed or told me, [Vice President Mike] Pence, or Chief of Staff [Mark Meadows] about the so-called attacks on our troops in Afghanistan by Russians, as reported through an 'anonymous source' by the Fake News @nytimes. Everybody is denying it & there have not been many attacks on us," Trump said on Twitter.
Trump, a critic of The New York Times, also called the fresh claims voiced by the outlet "probably just another phony."
In a different tweet minutes later, the US president said he was amused to see Biden read "a statement on Russia, which was obviously written by his handlers."
"Russia ate his and [former US president Barack] Obama's lunch during their time in office, so badly that Obama wanted them out of the then G-8. U.S. was weak on everything, but especially Russia!" Trump said.
The Russian Foreign Ministry responded to the allegations on Saturday by calling the report "fake news" that pursued to disrupt the Russian-endorsed US-led Afghan peace process. The Taliban have also denied the claims.
