Russian foreign minister contradicts White House account of election interference meeting

Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov has disputed an official White House account of his meeting with Donald Trump and secretary of state Mike Pompeo, who told reporters that the US warned Russia against interfering in US elections.

After a meeting on Tuesday, Mr Lavrov told reporters that they had "not discussed elections" — but he also contradicted himself by deferring to statements made by Mr Pompeo at an earlier joint press conference, where the secretary called interference "unacceptable".

The White House account of the meeting said that the men briefed the president "regarding the state of the bilateral relationship between the United States and Russia" during which Mr Trump "warned against any Russian attempts to interfere" in elections and "urged Russia to resolve the conflict with Ukraine", which has endured ongoing Russian-backed military attacks since 2014.

Before the meeting, Mr Lavrov appeared to clash with Mr Pompeo about Russia's role in an interference campaign, which intelligence officials have concluded was a "sweeping and systemic" social media attack intended to boost Mr Trump. Officials also have warned similar attacks are likely in 2020.

The Justice Department also indicted 12 Russian hackers in 2018 for breaching the Democratic National Committee and the campaign of former Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton.

Mr Pompeo said interference was "unacceptable" and that the Trump administration would "always work to protect the integrity" of US elections.

He said the US will "take action" if it determines foreign influence in the US electoral process.

Mr Pompeo said: "We don't think there's any mistake about what really transpired there ... I made our expectations clear."

But Mr Lavrov objected, saying that reports of interference are "baseless".

He added: "It's an open secret we have different views on different things ... We have highlighted once again that all speculations about our alleged interference in domestic processes in the United States are baseless ... There are no facts that would support that. We did not see these facts. No one has given us this proof because it simply does not exist."

He said he read special counsel Robert Mueller's report, following a two-year investigation with a detailed account of America's vulnerability to foreign influence.

Mr Lavrov said the report had "no proof of any collusion".

The meeting arrived on the heels of Democrats launching articles of impeachment against the president and a report from the Justice Department's inspector general debunking the administration's insistence that the investigation into Russia's role in the president's election was politically motivated.

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