Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin believed killed in Moscow plane crash: Report

NEW DELHI,AUG 24 : Russia’s most powerful mercenary Yevgeny Prigozhin was on board a plane which crashed on Wednesday evening north of Moscow with no survivors, the Russian authorities said, two months to the day after he led an abortive mutiny against the army top brass.

There was no official comment from the Kremlin or the Defence Ministry on the fate of Prigozhin, head of the Wagner mercenary group and a self-declared enemy of the army’s leadership over what he argued was its incompetent prosecution of Russia’s war in Ukraine.

A Telegram channel linked to Wagner, Grey Zone, pronounced him dead, however, and hailed him as a hero and a patriot who it said had died at the hands of unidentified people it called “traitors to Russia.”

Amid fevered speculation and an absence of verifiable facts, some of his supporters pointed the finger of blame at the Russian state; others at Ukraine, which was due to mark its independence day on Thursday.

building housing Wagner’s offices in St Petersburg lit up its windows after dark in such a way as to display a giant cross in a mark of respect and mourning.

Prigozhin’s death would leave the Wagner Group, which incurred President Vladimir Putin’s wrath in June by staging an abortive armed mutiny against the army’s top brass, leaderless and raise questions about its future operations in Africa and elsewhere.

Whoever or whatever was behind the crash, his death would also rid Putin of someone who had mounted the most serious challenge to the Russian leader’s authority since he came to power in 1999.

WAGNER CO-FOUNDER ALSO ON PLANE

Rosaviatsia, Russia’s aviation agency, published the names of all 10 people on board the downed plane, including Prigozhin and that of Dmitry Utkin, his right-hand man who helped found the mercenary group and bore the call sign “Wagner”.

Russian investigators said they had opened a criminal investigation to determine what had happened. Some unnamed sources told Russian media they believed the plane had been shot down by one or more surface-to-air missiles. Reuters could not confirm that.

The aircraft, which had been travelling from Moscow to St. Petersburg, had crashed near the village of Kuzhenkino in the Tver Region, Russia’s emergency situations ministry said.

-PTI