Denver Post: Trump has a record of siding with Putin on key issues

[riversedge]

http://www.denverpost.com/2016/07/28/trump-record-of-siding-with-putin-on-issues/


Trump has a record of siding with Putin on key issues

Carolyn Kaster, The Associated Press
Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump speaks on July 22, 2016 during the Republican National Convention in Cleveland.
By The Associated Press
July 28, 2016 at 11:19 pm

MOSCOW (AP) — Donald Trump has refused to condemn Russia’s military takeover of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula, saying if elected he would consider recognizing it as Russian territory, in the latest of a series of statements that have raised eyebrows about the Republican candidate’s intentions toward the Kremlin.

“We’ll be looking at that. Yeah, we’ll be looking,” Trump told reporters on Wednesday.

Accepting Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea would be a radical departure from U.S. policy. The United States and the European Union worked together to punish Russia by imposing economic sanctions and have shown no willingness to lift them. Even Belarus, Russia’s closest ally and neighbor, did not recognize the annexation.

While Trump has sided with Putin on a wide range of issues, Putin has not openly backed the Republican nominee and the Kremlin denies interfering in the U.S. electoral process. Hillary Clinton’s campaign claimed that Russia was behind the hacking of Democratic National Committee computers as part of an effort to undermine her candidacy......................