Calls to cancel Putin summit over email hacking

DONALD TRUMP faced calls last night to cancel his summit with Vladimir Putin after 12 senior Russian intelligence officers were charged with hacking into Democrats’ computers during the 2016 US presidential election.

The charges were brought as part of special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia.

Chuck Schumer, the Democrat leader in the US Senate, and other Democrats, called for the meeting to be cancelled until Russia proved it would not interfere in future elections.

According to the charges, the 12 agents used “spear-phishing” techniques to access the emails of officials at the Democratic National Committee, and the campaign of Hillary Clinton. They are also accused of stealing information on 500,000 voters after hacking a state election board. There is no evidence vote tallies were altered.

It is also alleged that the Russians hacked companies supplying software for the administration of elections.