MOSCOW.- Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of the Wagner mercenary group, has become one of the most prominent figures in the Ukrainian war. His harsh criticism – continuously – of the Russian Defense Ministry and military commanders has led to him being increasingly seen as a potential threat to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The mercenaries led by Prigozhin have been playing a significant role in the war in Ukraine, the most recent in the fighting for the capture of the city of Bakhmut from the hands of the Ukrainian forces, which has lasted for months.
This efficiency of the Wagner Group and the good results of its actions on the battlefield have led the leader of the group to grow up and launch a smear campaign against the main Russian military leaders. In recent months, Prigozhin has repeatedly accused Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu of incompetence and deliberately short-supplying Wagner Group units fighting in Ukraine.
The months of tension between Prigozhin and the Russian military leadership have exploded this Friday with the entry of the Wanger Group mercenaries into the Russian city of Rostov, something that the Russian president has described as “treason”.
Putin calls Wagner boss’s rebellion a betrayalPlay video00.55 minPutin calls Wagner boss’s rebellion a betrayal
Who is Yevgeny Prigozhin?
Yevengeny Prigozhin was born in 1961 in what was then known as Leningrad -now Saint Petersburg. In 1981 he was convicted of robbery and assault, for which he was sentenced to 12 years in prison.
Once released and after the fall of the Soviet Union, Prigozhin set out on a path as an entrepreneur. He started out selling hot dogs from carts in his hometown and then moved on to bigger projects, like running a fancy restaurant in St. Petersburg. This restaurant became a center of attraction for Russian elites, including Putin, who then worked in the office of the mayor of Saint Petersburg.
Prigozhin used his Putin connections to found a catering company called Concord, which won exclusive and lucrative government contracts for state dinners, including Putin’s inauguration ceremony and a visit by then-US President George Bush to St. petersburg. These contracts led to Prigozhin becoming known as “Putin’s chef.”
He then expanded his business empire into other areas, including the media and a “troll factory” that led the United States to accuse him of interfering in the 2016 presidential election. Prigozhin later acknowledged founding, running, and financing the company. Wagner.
What is the Wagner Group?
The Wagner Group is a private military company with the capacity to deploy thousands of mercenaries in combat zones. The entity first emerged in 2014 in eastern Ukraine, in the weeks after Russia’s annexation of Crimea.
Prigozhin’s company was named after Wagner after its first commander, Dimitry Utkin, a retired Russian Army special forces lieutenant colonel who soon established a reputation for extreme brutality and ruthlessness.
Why has the conflict between the Wagner Group and the Russian Army arisen?
After Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the ability of Wagner fighters to advance into eastern Ukraine became a major military asset for the Kremlin.
The head of the Wagner Group has repeatedly criticized the Russian military leadership for failures in the war in Ukraine and accused high-ranking Russian military officials of incompetence.
Wagner Group seizes Russian city of Rostovplay video01.14 minWagner Group seizes Russian city of Rostov Prigozhin has increasingly raised his public profile, issuing statements via messaging apps to boast of Wagner Group’s alleged victories in the Ukrainian war, taunting their enemies and lodging complaints about Russia’s military high command.
The head of the mercenaries accused the Russian Army of attacking its fighters this Friday and promised revenge and put an end to the “evil” of the military leadership. Hours later, Prigozhin announced that he has the military installations in the Russian city of Rostov under control of his fighters.
What does the Wagner Group do in Ukraine?
After the Russian troops suffered great attrition in the last half of 2022 and with some setbacks that led them to lose a significant part of the territories they had occupied in the Kharkov and Kherson regions, the Wagner Group was assuming a role every increasingly relevant in the Ukrainian war. This group of mercenaries – repeatedly accused of war crimes and human rights violations – has been involved in Russia’s capture of the city of Bakhmut.
Several international media have reported that in the weeks leading up to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, mercenaries from the Wagner Group are suspected of being involved in “false flag” attacks in the east of the country designed to give Moscow a pretext to attack the Ukrainian territory.
Furthermore, the Wagner Group claimed in January 2023 that it had seized control of the Ukrainian town of Soledar, one of Moscow’s first major victories since the start of the war.
According to estimates by the United States Government, the Wagner Group could have around 50,000 combatants in Ukraine, around 10,000 paid combatants and 40,000 inmates in Russian prisons. In addition, the US government believes that the group spends around 100 million dollars a month on the conflict.
In September 2022, a video surfaced showing Prigozhin trying to recruit Russian prisoners from a prison to fight with his paramilitary organization in Ukraine.
Do you operate in any other country?
The Wagner Group has also been involved in conflicts in other parts of the world. Fighters from the Wagner Group have been deployed in Syria, where Russia supports the government of President Bashar al-Assad; in Libya they fought alongside the forces of Commander Khalifa Hafter and have also operated in the Central African Republic and are still present in Mali.
Senior Western diplomats have claimed the Wagner Group has seized control of a gold mine in the Central African Republic, where it has been accused of executing civilians, attacking UN peacekeepers and predominantly Muslim communities.
In Mali, the Army is relying on Wagner’s mercenaries to fight the jihadists, a task for which they previously received mostly the help of the European Union military.
