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Russia says US election upheaval shows schism in American society

The protagonists of ''American electoral theatre' should be viewed without illusions, says Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman

Russia said on Wednesday that the upheaval surrounding the US election, including an assassination attempt against Donald Trump and the exit of President Joe Biden from the race, showed the divisions in an American society in danger of "falling into a nosedive".

Former president Trump, the Republican candidate, was shot in the ear at a campaign rally on July 13, while Biden abandoned his reelection bid on Sunday and endorsed Vice- President Kamala Harris as the Democratic party's candidate.

Asked directly by Reuters who she would prefer as US president, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova did not express a clear preference.

"The United States is now in a situation where they ... wish to get through the current year without falling into a nosedive," Zakharova said.

She said that there was evidence of "deep divisions in American society" and "civil conflict" but that the United States still viewed Russia as an existential enemy. The protagonists of "American electoral theatre" should therefore be viewed without illusions, she added.

By Wednesday morning, President Vladimir Putin had yet to comment in public on Biden's exit from the race.

Putin has suggested several times in the past that, for Russia, Biden is preferable to Trump. US intelligence has indicated, however, that Russia would prefer a Trump victory, and previous US intelligence assessments have found that Moscow tried through influence campaigns to help Trump win in 2016, against Hillary Clinton, and in 2020 against Biden. Russia has denied that it sought to meddle in the elections, though Russian mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin repeatedly said before his death last year that he did interfere in the 2016 election.

Zakharova said: "Blaming Russia for its own troubles, miscalculations, problems, mistakes and shortcomings, it seems to me, is a manifestation of the disease of American democracy".

"We do not interfere in the internal affairs of sovereign states, much less exert influence, and do not model or exert pressure on electoral processes. The upcoming elections in the United States are no exception, we have never interfered in them previously."