Putin calls Trump legal cases ‘politically motivated persecution’

Russian President Vladimir Putin describes legal proceedings against former US president Donald Trump as “politically motivated persecution.”

The Kremlin, seen as having friendly relations with Trump, has repeatedly spoken out in defense of the former president, who is facing a series of charges linked to election interference.

“As for the persecution of Trump, for us, in the current environment, it’s good because it shows the rottenness of the American system,” Putin says at an economic forum in East Asia. “It is a politically motivated persecution of one’s competitor.”

Putin, who served in the Soviet security services and is himself widely accused of persecuting, jailing and assassinating political rivals, added: “And this shows who we are fighting… As they said in Soviet times: ‘The bestial face of American capitalism.'”

Relations between Washington and Moscow, strained by a litany of issues under Putin, have hit new lows since the Kremlin launched a large-scale invasion of Ukraine.