Putin: US-Russia ties have worsened under Trump

Russian President Vladimir Putin says relations between Russia and the United States have worsened since President Trump took office.

“One could say that the level of trust on a working level, especially on the military level, has not improved, but rather has deteriorated,” Putin said Wednesday, according to Reuters.

Trump last week ordered the U.S. military to launch missiles at a Syrian air base believed to be the launching point of a deadly chemical weapons attack earlier this month, which U.S. and Western officials have blamed on Syrian President Bashar Assad, who is facing armed opposition in the country’s yearslong civil war.

{mosads}The Kremlin has been supporting Assad both militarily and politically since the start of the conflict in 2011.

The chemical weapons attack, Putin said in the interview, is either the result of a Syrian government airstrike hitting a rebel stockpile or was staged to put fault on Assad.

Trump has called for friendlier relations with with Russia during his campaign and since Election Day. The U.S. intelligence community concluded that Moscow interfered in last year’s presidential election specifically to help Trump win, and the FBI and both chambers of Congress have open investigations into Russian election interference as well as links between Trump’s associates and the Kremlin.