Nikki Haley warns Moscow of 'consequences' for interfering in US elections

Washington: US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley has said the international community is “concerned” about Russian poll meddling and that Moscow should know there are “consequences” for interfering in US elections. “I can tell you, the international community is concerned about Russia’s meddling within all of their elections,” Haley said on CBS News’ “Face the Nation” in an interview on Sunday. “But they’re concerned about Russia for a lot of reasons. And so we’ll continue to keep our eye on them. And when we can work with them, we want to try and do that. But when we can’t, we’re going to hold the line.” [caption id=“attachment_3523245” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] File image of US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley. Reuters[/caption] The Indian-American lawmaker — when asked why sanctions aren’t being imposed on Russia — emphasised the US isn’t going easy on Russia. “Well, I think that, you know, they’re going through the motions of the investigation,” Haley said. “I could tell you we’ve taken actions against Russia in the UN Security Council. We’ve stood strong on the sanctions in their situations with Ukraine. We called them out in their association with the Assad regime.” “We’re going to continue to call them out as we need to,” Haley continued. “At the same time, we are trying to see if we can have talks with them on how to better come in line in the Syrian conflict. We’re working with them on counter-terrorism. But if we see Russia doing anything wrong, we’re going to tell them.” Haley said that she will support whatever Congress decides to do in terms of sanctions against Russia. Pressure was mounting on US officials to take a tougher stance on Russia, even as Trump himself is reluctant to criticise the Kremlin and Russian President Vladimir Putin, the report said. Haley also had tough words for North Korea. Tensions between the US and North Korea continue to mount amid the latter’s frequent missile tests. The temperature of the North Korea situation right now is “volatile”, Haley said. “I think what you can see is that we have worked very closely with China,” Haley said. “China has really stood up in putting the pressure on North Korea. And yesterday the Security Council voted to increase sanctions on individuals and entities that are related to those ballistic missile tests,” she said.