Russian president Vladimir Putin condemned the political opponents of US president-elect Donald Trump as "worse than prostitutes" for leaking claims that the Kremlin had compromising information on him.
Mr Putin came to the defence of the incoming US president, telling reporters that an unsubstantiated document compiled by a former British spy accusing the New York businessman of colluding with Russia was an attempt by the outgoing Obama administration to undermine the legitimacy of Mr Trump.
Denouncing as "complete nonsense" the allegations that Russia had "kompromat" – damaging materials that could be used to damage a political or public figure – on Mr Trump, Mr Putin questioned why Russian intelligence would have to spy on the property mogul before he entered politics.
“We did not even know about his political ambitions,” said the Russian leader at a news conference. “He was just a businessman, one of the richest men in America. Is someone really thinking that our intelligence agencies are chasing every American billionaire, or what? Of course not. It’s just complete nonsense.”
Damaging information
The allegations, detailed in a 35-page dossier privately circulated before the election, claim that the Kremlin had damaging information about Mr Trump's business interests and that the Russians had a salacious video of the businessman with prostitutes at a hotel in Moscow during the Miss Universe pageant in 2013.
Mr Trump, who announced his presidential bid in 2015, has called the allegations “fake news” and “phoney stuff” made up by his political enemies. Mr Putin said in Moscow that the claims were an “obvious fake”.
Mr Putin pondered, in colourful terms, why Mr Trump would meet prostitutes in Moscow when he was organising beauty pageants and meeting “the most beautiful women in the world”.
“I find it hard to imagine he ran to a hotel to meet our girls of low social responsibility – though they are of course also the best in the world – but I doubt Trump took that bait,” he said.
Details of the dossier surfaced when CNN last week reported that US intelligence agencies considered the allegations significant enough to inform Mr Trump and President Barack Obama about their existence.
‘Failing pile of garbage’
Online news outlet BuzzFeed later published the dossier, drawing an angry response from Mr Trump at his first press conference since being elected. He called the website a “failing pile of garbage”.
The dossier has heightened tensions between the president-elect and the spy agencies whom he has accused of leaking the information. He has described the move as similar to the practices of Nazi Germany.
Mr Trump has said that he would offer to end US sanctions against Russia over its annexation of Crimea in return for a nuclear arms reduction deal with Russia.
CIA director John Brennan criticised the proposal, saying that Mr Trump did not have a "full understanding" of Russia's power and threat to the world.
The Republican for weeks rejected the view of US intelligence agencies that Russian hackers stole and leaked information that was damaging to Mr Trump's rival Hillary Clinton with the aim of helping Mr Trump win the election. He conceded last week for the first time that he believed Russia was behind the hacks.
