25 Aug 2023 at 11:51
Wagner leader Yevgeny Prigozhin died in a plane crash in Russia on Wednesday. Nine others, including Wagner chief commander Dmitry Utkin, were also killed. Politicians worldwide react critically to the news and express their doubts about the cause of the crash.
Gray Zone, a Telegram channel linked to the Wagner Group, reported that Prigozhin died “as a result of actions of traitors to Russia”.
US President Joe Biden says he is not exactly sure what happened, but he is not surprised. Few things happen in Russia that Putin is not behind.
Mykhailo Podolyak, the adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, is also critical of the crash. He calls Prigozhin’s death two months after the conflict between him and the Kremlin “a signal” to Russia ahead of the 2024 elections: “Beware. Infidelity equals death.”
“If it is true (that Putin is behind the crash, ed.), this shows that Putin eliminates opponents and wants to scare anyone who expresses a different opinion from his own,” said Estonian prime minister Kaja Kallas.
“Should we still wonder whether threat from Wagner is getting bigger?”
Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki is not reassured by Prigozhin’s death. “The Wagner Group will now be headed by Putin,” he said at a press conference on Thursday. “Do we still have to ask ourselves whether the threat will become bigger or smaller? That is a rhetorical question for me.”
Former CIA officer Daniel Hoffman also has no doubt that the crash was ordered by Putin. “This is about the security of the regime for Vladimir Putin. You cannot allow someone you called a traitor to live at the end of June.” He states that Prigozhin was not arrested “to give him a kind of false sense of security and freedom of movement”.
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Prigozhin did Putin’s dirty work
“We don’t yet know under what circumstances the crash took place, but we may have our doubts,” said French government spokesman Olivier Véran. He called Prigozhin the man who “did Putin’s dirty work” and said that “he leaves a terrible mess in many parts of the world, including Africa and Ukraine”.
Annalena Baerbock, Germany’s foreign minister, said Russia will continue “this cynical game” in Ukraine, but also in Africa. “We must not forget that Prigozhin and Wagner are responsible for heinous crimes.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin himself, whom many therefore assume was behind the crash, spoke remarkably positively about the Wagner boss. “He was a complicated person, who made serious mistakes in his life.” Putin was referring to the uprising of Wagner and Prigozhin in June. “But he always looked for a way to get necessary results. He always succeeded when I asked him to.”
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2023-08-25 09:51:00
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