Jakarta, CNN Indonesia —
Russia has sent 190 thousand soldiers to the border Ukraine. Of that number, there was a small group of mercenaries who came from the Wagner Group.
In the report The Times quoted The EconomistThere are 400 Russian mercenaries reportedly on a mission to assassinate Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. The presence of the Wagner Group is not a surprise because they have several times established close relations with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The Wagner Group is accused of being part of separatist efforts in Luhansk and Donetsk to separate from Ukraine. They are also suspected of being involved in fighting in several African countries such as Libya, Syria, Mozambique, Mali, Sudan and the Central African Republic.
“From a legal perspective, Wagner doesn’t really exist,” said Sorcha MacLeod, a UN official who focuses on mercenary issues.
According to a European Union report, the Wargner Group was formed by former Russian soldier Dmitry Utkin in 2014 as a private military organization. He had served as an agent of the Russian Federal Intelligence Service (GRU) with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel.
In 2016 iNews reported, Utkin had been invited by Putin to the Kremlin Palace at an award ceremony for soldiers serving in Ukraine two years earlier.
A Russian businessman Yevgeny Prigozhin is rumored to be one of the diverters of the Wagner Group’s operational funds, as well as providing ammunition and aircraft. Unfortunately, there is no clear information on the size of the Wagner Group budget and the wages of its members.
More about the Wagner Group, read on the next page…
The Wagner Group
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