Aug 27, 2023 at 12:46 PM Update: 11 minutes ago
Russian investigators have identified the body of deceased Wagner Group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin near the crashed plane. The identities of the nine other victims also match the names on the passenger list, authorities say.
The leader of the mercenary army Wagner Group was killed in a plane crash north of Moscow on Wednesday. Wagner chief commander Dmitry Utkin also did not survive the crash.
There was uncertainty about Prigozhin’s death for a long time, because his death was not confirmed. There was only a passenger list from the plane that contained his name and a Telegram channel that confirmed the death. Russian President Vladimir Putin has already expressed his condolences to Prigozhin’s family.
Receive notifications on news about the war in Ukraine Stay informed with notifications
Although his death has now been confirmed, the cause of the crash is still a mystery. It is still being investigated by the same investigators who identified the bodies. They found flight recorders and documents with the remains of the plane to study.
Ukraine and the west immediately pointed to Putin and the Kremlin, while fingers in Moscow pointed to the west. “Few things happen in Russia that Putin isn’t behind,” US President Joe Biden speculated aloud.
1:10 Play button
From confidant to traitor
In the 1990s, 62-year-old Prigozhin made it from a hot dog seller via his own catering company to Putin’s ‘chef’. From that role, Prigozhin grew into a confidant of the Russian president.
Because in addition to catering state banquets, he also did other chores for Putin. For example, he led the ‘troll factory’ that influenced the US presidential election in 2016. Two years earlier, Prigozhin founded a mercenary army.
In the early years, the Wagner Group was mainly active in Africa. But Prigozhin’s mercenary army became best known for the Russian invasion of Ukraine, in which Wagner fought on the Russian side. Striking was the criticism that Prigozhin openly expressed on the Russian army command.
For example, his troops would be undersupplied by the Russians. Experts also saw that criticism as a way for Prigozhin to increase his power. Something that the Russian Ministry of Defense was trying to prevent. That battle reached a boiling point in 2023.
Wild theories about plane crash
The Russians wanted Wagner to sign a contract that would put the mercenaries in the service of the Russian army. Prigozhin refused. Not much later he reacted furiously to an alleged attack by Russia on his troops. He started a rebellion and moved towards Moscow with his mercenary army.
Putin called the march “high treason” and prepared for possible confrontations. They did not materialize, the two parties concluded an agreement. The mercenary army retreated and would not be prosecuted. But that agreement did not remove the mutual mistrust, especially between Putin and Prigozhin.
After the uprising, Prigozhin appeared in Belarus and last week in Africa. But a few days later there was the news of the crash of his plane. Given Prigozhin’s uprising, it is likely that Putin was behind the crash of the plane. But for now there are only wild theories and no facts or evidence.
2023-08-27 10:46:00
#Body #Wagner #leader #Prigozhin #identified #Russian #investigators #War #Ukraine
