Concerns about Russia’s interference in the US election have increased. Now three Russians are charged with “malicious influence campaign”.
WASHINGTON DC – Three Russian nationals are being arrested for interfering with an election in the US Department of Justice, the US Department of Justice has announced USA charged. Specifically, they are said to be interested in a candidate in a 2019 municipal election campaign in Saint Petersburg, Florida of Russia have funded. This emerges from the official statement by the Ministry of Justice on Tuesday (April 18).
One of the accused, Aleksandr Viktorovich Ionov from Moscow, is also said to have worked with the Russian security apparatus to carry out a “malicious influence campaign” in US elections, the ministry continues. He, along with two officials from the Russian security service, Aleksey Borisovich Sukhodolov and Yegor Sergeyevich Popov, is accused of planning a joint effort to “directly and significantly influence democratic elections in the United States,” the Justice Ministry said.
US elections: Defendants from Russia spoke of “our election campaign”
Russia has been accused of interfering in US elections on several occasions in the past. The latest indictment comes at a time when tensions between the US and Russia over the Ukraine War are high anyway. Against Kremlin boss Wladimir Putins so-called “special military operation” delivers the administration of the US President Joe Biden arms to Ukraine.
The defendants are said to have funded and directed the political campaign of a candidate running in the 2019 US local elections in Florida. The supplemental indictment also alleges that Popov specifically referred to these efforts on behalf of Russia as “our election campaign,” and Ionov specifically referred to the candidate as “a candidate that we oversee,” according to the Justice Department. However, the authorities did not name the specific candidate or the tactics with which he was to be promoted.
Manipulation of US elections: Russia targeted the 2022 presidential election
The mayor of the affected city, Kenneth T. Welch, told the magazine Newsweekthat the allegations are “troubling”. “It is important to emphasize that the City of Saint Petersburg does not support, condone, or tolerate any foreign government engaged in activities designed to undermine or influence our elections,” Welch said.
The accused are said to have planned to influence the elections in Saint Petersburg. They are said to have discussed the US presidential election in 2020 as the “main topic of the year”, the Justice Department said. In addition to interfering in the elections, Ionov is said to have tried to create the false impression that the population supported Russia’s annexation of Ukrainian territories.
US elections: Prigozhin admitted to interference by Russia
Concerns about Russia’s interference in the US election have increased in recent years amid strained relations between Washington and Moscow. Ahead of the 2022 US midterm elections, Yevgeny Prigozhin, Putin confidante and founder of the Wagner groupeven explicitly that Russia is interfering in US elections have.
“Gentlemen, we have interfered, we are interfering and we will continue to interfere. Carefully, accurately, surgically and in our own way, as we know how to do it,” Prigozhin wrote on a Russian social media platform. Following his statements, the White House said in 2022 that there was no credible evidence that Russia was able to influence the elections. (n / A)
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