21 July, 2017
Remarks by CIA Director Michael Pompeo who said that Russia had meddled in the United States elections for more than eight years go beyond the boundaries of reason, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Friday.
A stable Syria can not exist under the Assad regime, the CIA director said, noting that he was speaking from an intelligence perspective, not a political one, while calling the Syrian leader "the puppet of the Iranians".
Speaking at the Aspen Security Forum on Thursday, Pompeo avoided stating a position for Washington on regime change, but said the administration was focused on separating North Korean leader Kim Jong Un from his nation's nuclear arsenal.
Russian Federation will stay in Syria, he said, because it loves its naval port in Tartus, off the Mediterranean Sea.
Pompeo continued his criticism of the Obama administration's nuclear deal with Iran.
Iranian compliance with the nuclear agreement does not add up to pursuing the goals the accord was designed for, the Central Intelligence Agency director said, comparing Iran to "a bad tenant". He noted that President Donald Trump has been working with Gulf states and Israel to find a common way to push back against Iranian aggression in the region.
When asked if Russia is America's friend or adversary, Pompeo replied: "It's complicated", and added that it was clear that Russians "find anyplace they can to make our lives more hard".
Pompeo also addressed the threat from North Korea and said Trump asks questions about Pyongyang almost every time he sees him.
Although Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has in the past said the USA was against forcing Kim out of power or the collapse of his government, Pompeo said that the administration needed to find a way to separate Kim from his growing nuclear stockpile.
"The North Korea people - I'm sure are lovely people - and would love to see him go as well".
"And then the next day there's an old, exhausted sofa in the front yard and you tell them to take it away, and you know they drag it to the back".
On another issue, Pompeo said he believes WikiLeaks will "take down America any way it can".
Pompeo's statement was also challenged by Iraqi Vice President Nouri Maliki, who said that without Russian Federation, "the region would be fully destroyed", Sputnik reports, citing Maliki.
During the campaign, President Donald Trump spoke about a desire to work with Russian Federation, and since he took office, many have watched to see if the two nations would grow closer.
Besides Edward Snowden, a former National Security Agency contractor who leaked documents revealing extensive US government surveillance, WikiLeaks has released almost 8,000 documents that it says reveal secrets about the CIA's cyberespionage tools for breaking into computers.
