Acquaintance means nothing

The Ambassador of Russia to the United States Sergey Kislyak performed the usual work of the diplomat, meeting with many American officials. This was stated by the press secretary of the Russian president Dmitry Peskov, the BBC reports .

“This is his work. He talked about bilateral relations, he talked about what was happening in the United States so that we had a better understanding in Moscow. This is what is done by any Russian ambassador abroad, any US ambassador abroad, including in Moscow, because with a large number of people the Ambassador talking in the country of his stay, the better work he does,” Peskov said.

The presidential spokesman also noted that Kislyak repeatedly met people from the environment of presidential candidates, both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. However, at such meetings, we were not talking about elections in the United States, Peskov emphasized. "There were no meetings devoted to the elections, the electoral process. This should in no case be perceived as interference in the electoral process," he said.

Fragments of interviews with Peskov showed CNN in the announcement of the documentary "The Most Mighty Man in the World", which is dedicated to Vladimir Putin and should be aired on March 13.

Meetings of Trump's employees with the Russian ambassador before the president’s entry into the office became the reason for numerous scandals. On February 13, Michael Flynn, adviser to Trump for National Security. It turned out that he misinformed Vice President Mike Pence regarding the details of his conversations with Kislyak. Journalists found that in the conversations held in December 2016, even before the inauguration of Trump and Pence, issues of American sanctions against Russia were discussed. Flynn, not being an official at that time, did not have the right to affect this topic in a conversation with the Russian ambassador.

When information about the conversations ended up in the media, the American official initially denied that he had discussed the issues of sanctions with Kislyak. However, later a representative of Flynn said that the adviser "does not remember the discussion of sanctions, but cannot be sure that this topic has never been raised." Flynn later said that in conversations with the ambassador he "did not cross the line." "If this happened, the FBI would grab me by the throat, and my admission would be withdrawn. I did not pass any borders," Flynn said.

On March 2, the Washington Post reported that the current US Minister of Justice Jeff Sehns in 2016 met with Russian ambassador Sergei Kislyak . It was argued that Sehns did not mention them at the hearing in the Senate when he considered his candidacy for the post of head of the Ministry of Justice. Democrats demanded the immediate resignation of Seshns.