Putin mocks Tucker Carlson over his failed attempt to join CIA

Vladimir Putin mocked Tucker Carlson for trying – and failing – to join the CIA, during their more than two-hour-long, freewheeling interview released on Thursday.

The remark came during a discussion of the 2014 political protests in Ukraine, which led to the ouster of its then-President Viktor Yanukovich and subsequently Russia’s annexation of Crimea and backing of so-called pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine.

The Russian president went on to claim that his 2022 invasion of Ukraine was an attempt to put an end to the conflict that he falsely argued Ukraine had began back in 2014.

Mr Putin said that the “entire Ukrainian economy” used to be based on trade with Russia.

“The cooperation ties between the enterprises were very close since the times of the Soviet Union. One enterprise there used to produce components to be assembled both in Russia and Ukraine and vice versa. There used to be very close ties,” he said.

“A coup d’etat was committed, although, I shall not delve into details now as I find doing it inappropriate, the US told us, ‘Calm Yanukovich down and we will calm the opposition. Let the situation unfold in the scenario of a political settlement’. We said, ‘Alright. Agreed. Let’s do it this way’. As the Americans requested us, Yanukovich did use neither the Armed Forces, nor the police, yet the armed opposition committed a coup in Kiev. What is that supposed to mean? ‘Who do you think you are?’, I wanted to ask the then-US leadership,” he said.

“With the backing of whom?” Mr Carlson asked.

“With the backing of CIA, of course.”

At that point, Mr Putin jabbed at the right-wing media figure for his own past efforts applying to work for the CIA.

“The organisation you wanted to join back in the day,