Claims that Russia conspired with Taliban to kill U.S. servicemen are unfounded, absurd - Russian Security Council Secretary Patrushev
MOSCOW. July 7 (Interfax) - Claims that Moscow has conspired with the Taliban [a terrorist organization banned in Russia] for the purpose of killing U.S. servicemen stationed in Afghanistan are unfounded and absurd, Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev said.
"These are absurd allegations which could be made only by those who have a poor knowledge of the situation in Afghanistan or knowingly distort the real state of regional affairs," Patrushev said in an interview with the newspaper Argumenty i Fakty.
"Any claims that our country has conspired with the Taliban, especially for the purpose of killing U.S. servicemen, are totally groundless," Patrushev said.
Russia "has never cooperated with the Taliban," Patrushev said, adding that the organization was formally branded as terrorist by the Russian Supreme Court in 2003.
As to his attitude to the White House report, which said U.S. President Donald Trump pledged serious measures if the information about the Russia-Taliban conspiracy appeared to be true, Patrushev said, "This is not some information. These are baseless conjectures of journalists, which have already been denied by the White House and the Pentagon."
"The U.S. administration has repeatedly endorsed sanctions against our country on the basis of fake news. This time, their media outlets are using Afghanistan, which has been a subject of regular dialogue between our countries until recently and must have displeased certain political circles," Patrushev said.
"The unfriendly act in our regard could hardly help restore the atmosphere of trust, which Moscow, as well as Washington has been talking about for years," he said.
Russian and U.S. security services are cooperating in a broad range of areas, including the suppression of terrorism, he said.
"The suppression of terrorism is an area where practical results have been achieved," Patrushev said.
"I want to believe that U.S. media outlets will demonstrate a more responsible attitude to their reports in the future and will not provoke tensions in the relations between Moscow and Washington. We can only hope that from now on, the U.S. political circles will be solving their domestic problems without trying to score election points at Russia's expense," Patrushev said.
The New York Times' article said with the reference to unnamed U.S. officials that Russian military intelligence allegedly offered bounties to the Taliban for attacking U.S. servicemen in Afghanistan. The newspaper said the offers were made amid talks on a peaceful settlement of the Afghan conflict.