Former tennis player Andrei Medvedev did not join Wagner’s ranks. On the other hand, a namesake was arrested after illegally crossing the Russian-Norwegian border on the night of Thursday 12 to Friday 13 January. The Russian Andreï Medvedev, 26, presenting himself as a former mercenary of this Russian paramilitary group led by businessman Evguéni Prigojine, would have managed to flee his country by crossing the border in the Arctic. He will seek asylum in Norway, his Norwegian lawyer, Brynjulf Risnes, said on Monday.
In interview broadcast by human rights NGO Gulagu, who claims to have helped him to flee, Andrei Medvedev explains that he joined the Wagner group on July 6, 2022, with a four-month contract, where he led a dozen men into battle, of which he was the leader. At the end of this period, this former soldier of the Russian army, who served a prison sentence between 2017 and 2018, would have learned that Wagner intended to extend his commitment for an indefinite period.
According to his lawyer, his client had nevertheless decided not to renew his contract with Wagner after having experienced “something completely different from what he expected”. Prolonged against his will, the young man would then have made the choice to desert and would have hidden for two months in Russia.
“My former employers tried to find me, the Wagner company, Prigozhin and his gang, the FSB (Russian State Security). They issued a wanted notice for a crime against me via the Russian Ministry of the Interior” , he detailed. “I was under the threat of being kidnapped, of being murdered, of being shot, or even worse, of being condemned to the mass like Noujine”, an ex-convict and deserter from Wagner whose appalling execution with a mass had been filmed and made public in mid-November.
In an interview with the Russian independent online newspaper The Insider and in the video posted on Gulagu’s YouTube channel, Andrei Medvedev explains that he left the Wagner group after personally witnessing the murders of recruits who refused to fight against the Ukrainians or who wanted to desert. The young man claims to be aware of ten cases where the “Wagnerians” allegedly executed their mercenaries.
“He is ready to talk about his experience in the Wagner group to people who investigate war crimes,” said Brynjulf Risnes. Andreï Medvedev would indeed have taken with him evidence of these war crimes committed in Ukraine. The Wagner mercenary group, very present in Africa, is suspected of numerous abuses in Ukraine. He is currently leading the fight for the capture of the city of Soledar, in the east of this country.
As reminded The worldthis is not the first time that Andrei Medvedev has sounded the alarm about the abuses committed by this private military company. In December 2022, through Gulaguhe was already challenging the Russian authorities on these extrajudicial executions and asking for the intervention of the FSB and the Russian President, Vladimir Putin.
Andrei Medvedev’s story of the flight to Norway is worthy of a spy novel. In the video published by Gulagu, he says he left Nikel, an urban commune in Murmansk Oblast in white camouflage. After crossing a frozen river, the Pasvik, which separates Russia from Norway, a patrol of Russian border guards spots him and goes after him.
“I heard dogs barking, I turned around, I saw people with flashlights, about 150 meters away, running in my direction,” he says. “I heard two shots, the bullets whizzed by very far […] I ran on the ice with the help of house lights, for about two kilometres”, continues this defector, who also broke his phone. According to his lawyer, he then went to see Norwegians explaining to them that he had illegally crossed the border, before being arrested by the police shortly afterwards.Also according to Brynjulf Risnes, his client is now in the “region of Oslo”, the capital of Norway.
On TelegramWagner tries to discredit the former mercenary, relates The world. “Yes, indeed, Andrei Medvedev fought in Nidhögg, Wagner’s Norwegian battalion, because he has Norwegian nationality, but he should have been prosecuted for trying to mistreat prisoners, explains the group, answering questions from the newspaper Norwegian Aftenposten. Until now, he was on the wanted list. Be careful, he is very dangerous.”
The Russian paramilitary group, however, does not address accusations of murder and ill-treatment against its own recruits. Brynjulf Risnes in any case denied these claims by Wagner on Monday, saying that his client “has absolutely no Norwegian nationality or any previous connection with Norway, as far as I know”.
