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Nikki Haley: Russia committed 'warfare' against USA
Ms Nikki Haley, the outspoken US Ambassador to the United Nations, claims that Russia committed clear “warfare” against the US in 2016 through their interference into the 2016 presidential election.
"When a country can come interfere in another country's elections, that is warfare. It really is, because you're making sure that the democracy shifts from what the people want to giving out that misinformation.”
Russia has been accused of buying ads on various social media platforms such as Google, Facebook and Twitter to influence US voters as well as hacking various private servers.
Ms Haley is yet another member of the White House security team to denounce Russia in these matters, saying that it is clear that another nation tried to intervene in the US democratic process.
"I will say that I hope we are on top of what really happened to us, that we're really investigating it in ways that bring all of our tools, including what people in places like Google and Facebook will know about how this is done," she said.
Ms Haley made the remarks during a panel discussion together with former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who served in the Bush administration.
Ms Rice is known to be an expert on Russia. She had pushed therefore for the Trump administration to appoint Mr Rex Tillerson. It was clear that both Ms Rice and Ms Haley agreed on the nature of Russia’s intentions in these matters.
The current US Ambassador to the United Nations continued: "I find it fascinating because the Russians, God bless them, they're saying, 'Why are Americans anti-Russian? And why have we done the sanctions?’ Well, don't interfere in our elections and we won't be anti-Russian."
Ms Haley stressed that we are not the only country under attack from these Russian attempts to influence: "They are doing this everywhere. This is their new weapon of choice."
France, Ukraine and Germany have all made similar claims against Russian hacking and election meddling this year as well.
As long as Russian President Vladimir Putin continues on this course, the lifting of any sanctions is clearly a long way off.
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