21 April 2017 11:56 am
(Daily Mail, US), 19 April 2017 -
A Russian government think tank controlled by Vladimir Putin developed a plan to swing the 2016 U.S. presidential election to Donald Trump and undermine voters´ faith in the American electoral system, three current and four former U.S. officials told Reuters.
They described two confidential documents from the think tank as providing the framework and rationale for what U.S. intelligence agencies have concluded was an intensive effort by Russia to interfere with the Nov. 8 election. U.S. intelligence officials acquired the documents, which were prepared by the Moscow-based Russian Institute for Strategic Studies after the election. The institute is run by retired senior Russian foreign intelligence officials appointed by Putin’s office.
The documents might be seen as reviving claims Trump was helped to the White House by Moscow. The first Russian institute document was a strategy paper written last June that circulated at the highest levels of the Russian government.
A second institute document, distributed in the same way, warned that Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton was likely to win the election.