Russia: DNC hacking accusations are ‘total stupidity’

Russia on Thursday called accusations that it was behind a massive hack of Democratic National Committee emails “total stupidity.”

“It is so absurd it borders on total stupidity,” said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, according to Reuters.

{mosads}”As regards these [email] batches, that is not our headache. We never poke our noses into others’ affairs and we really don’t like it when people try to poke their nose into ours,” he continued.

“The Americans need to get to the bottom of what these emails are themselves and find out what it’s all about.”

Peskov also insisted that Moscow intends to remain neutral in the November election.

“We know perfectly well that candidates in the heat of a pre-election struggle say one thing, but that later, when under the weight of responsibility, their rhetoric becomes more balanced,” he said.

The DNC hack revealed a massive trove of emails, including some showing party officials weighing how to potentially undermine Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) in his primary fight against Hillary Clinton, who is now the Democratic presidential nominee.

U.S. intelligence officials on Tuesday said they are highly confident that Russia was responsible for the DNC hack.

Some have speculated that the emails, released through Wikileaks, may have been intended to hurt Clinton and help GOP nominee Donald Trump, who has praised Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Trump, though, has dismissed the idea that Russia is trying to help him by leaking the emails, calling it a “joke.”

Trump went on to spark controversy on Wednesday when he also said he hoped Russian hackers obtained Clinton’s emails from her private server and shared them with the FBI. He said on Thursday that he was only “being sarcastic.”

President Obama has also said it was “possible” that Russians are trying to interfere in the U.S. election by dumping the emails.

“I am basing this on what Mr. Trump himself has said,” the president said. “And I think that Trump’s gotten pretty favorable coverage back in Russia.”

Russian officials have warned the U.S. before that accusations it is interfering in the 2016 election could hurt relations.