Russian President Vladimir Putin said at his annual year-end news conference on Friday that US President Donald Trump was right to sue the BBC over edited excerpts of his speech, Reuters reports.
Trump is suing British public broadcaster BBC for at least $10 billion in damages over edited speech clips that appear to show him urging supporters to storm the US Capitol.
The lawsuit consists of one count of defamation and one count of violating Florida's Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act and seeks $5 billion for each violation.
"The once respected, now disgraced BBC defamed President Trump by intentionally, maliciously and fraudulently tampering with his speech in a brazen attempt to interfere in the 2024 presidential election," a spokesperson for Trump's legal team told Fox News Digital.
As a reminder, a month ago the BBC admitted that edited footage of Trump's speech from January 6, 2021, in their documentary program "Panorama" inadvertently created "the false impression that President Trump made a direct call for violent action", and said the segment would not be aired again.
Although the British state broadcaster apologized to the president for the way it edited his speech, it said it would not offer financial compensation, as Trump had requested.
Two of the BBC's top executives, director general Tim Davey and head of news Deborah Turnes, resigned over the incident and allegations of biased coverage. BBC chairman Samir Shah even sent a personal apology to the White House.