On Wednesday, Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of the Russian private military group “Wagner”, appeared in a video welcoming the group’s fighters in Belarus, telling them that they “will not now participate in the Ukraine war.”
In the video, which was posted on Prigozhin’s press service channel in Telegram, and Reuters has not yet been able to verify its authenticity, the group leader is heard welcoming the Wagner fighters and continuing his veiled attack on the Russian military leaders.
And Prigozhin said: “Hello guys. Welcome to the land of Belarus.”
Since the video was apparently shot after dark, only Prigozhin’s figure can be distinguished.
He said, “We fought with honor. You gave a lot to Russia. What is happening at the front is a disgrace now. We do not need to participate in it,” referring to the war in Ukraine.
Prigozhin then asked his men to deal well with the local population, and ordered them to train the Belarusian army and muster their strength for a “new journey to Africa”.
“Maybe we will go back to the special military operation in Ukraine at some point, when we are sure that we will not disgrace ourselves,” he said.
A man believed to be Dmitry Utkin, who helped found Wagner, then spoke to the men.
He said, “This is not the end. This is just the beginning of the largest work in the world that will be carried out very soon,” without giving further details.
Prigozhin’s star fell in the wake of his leadership of a short-lived rebellion inside Russia last June, which was ended by an agreement with Moscow under the auspices of Minsk by heading to Belarus.
#Prigozhin #Dark #Video #happening #Ukraine #disgrace
2023-07-19 14:35:15
