Helsinki summit: Evidence of Russia meddling in US election ‘compelling’

The PM contradicts Donald Trump over Russian interference in the US election, declaring spy agencies’ evidence ‘compelling’.

Melania Trump, Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump, pose with a soccer ball Mr Putin gave the Trumps. Picture: Kremlin Pool Photo via AP.

Malcolm Turnbull says he doesn’t trust Russian President Vladimir Putin and has contradicted US president Donald Trump on the question of Russian meddling in the US election, declaring the evidence of US intelligence agencies is “very compelling”.

The Prime Minister was responding to comments by President Trump in Finland, where he publicly challenged his own intelligence agencies over Moscow interference in the 2016 presidential election, suggesting he trusted the word of Vladimir Putin over US agents.

Mr Turnbull said he believed Russia had interfered in the campaign in which President Trump was elected over Hillary Clinton.

“I find the evidence that has been produced by the American intelligence community to be very compelling,” he told 3AW.

“But obviously there is a difference of opinion inside America.”

Mr Turnbull said he did not take Mr Putin at his word, as Mr Trump appeared to do at his closed door summit with Mr Putin in Helsinki.

“President Putin himself said you shouldn’t trust anybody,” Mr Turnbull said.

“I certainly don’t trust President Putin when he says he was not responsible for the shooting down of MH17 which occurred four years ago.”

Mr Trump has been accused of “treasonous” behaviour in the US over his comments in Helsinki overnight.

Standing beside the Russian President after their closed door meeting, Mr Trump said the two leaders had spent “a great deal of time” discussing the claim that Russia had hacked the election to help him win, and Mr Putin “was extremely strong and powerful in his denial today”.

Asked whether he believed his intelligence agencies or Mr Putin, the US President replied: “[Director of National Intelligence] Dan Coats came to me. They said, they think it’s Russia. I have President Putin, he just said it’s not Russia.

“I will say this, I don’t see any reason why it would be.”

Labor leader Bill Shorten said he and Malcolm Turnbull were “on the same page” in not trusting Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Mr Shorten said he would not “second guess” everything Donald Trump does, following the US President’s apparently friendly meeting with Mr Putin overnight.

“I’m not going to start trying to second guess everything that President Trump does — that’s longer than I think this press conference — but in terms of Putin, the head of Russia, I don’t trust him,” Mr Shorten said.

“Both Malcolm Turnbull and I are on the same page there, as I was with Tony Abbott.

“I have never been satisfied that President Putin has ever satisfactorily told the truth to the families of the victims of the Malaysian flight which was shot down over eastern Ukraine where Australians were killed.”

Asked whether President Trump’s approach to Putin undermined US credibility, Mr Shorten said the US-Australian alliance was stronger than individual personalities.

“We have a lot in common with the democratic values of the United States,” Mr Shorten said.

“The United States has been important to Australia’s foreign security, and of course, we’re alliance partners through the treaty.

“I’m not going to start diving into every aspect of American domestic politics, or, indeed, trying to second guess body language in a meeting in Helsinki, but I also have to say, and it’s with great regret, that President Putin has not been forthcoming, as he should have been, to explain to the families of murdered Australians what he knows and what role Russia had and what role they had in supplying weapons to separatists in eastern Ukraine which saw the dreadful murder of so many Australians and people who lived in Australia, Malaysian citizens, Dutch citizens, innocent people in the skies above Ukraine”