The death of Wagner’s boss has yet to be confirmed by the Russian government, but the Kremlin has denied ordering his assassination. Vladimir Putin’s spokesman, Dimitri Peskov, declared that accusations that the Kremlin gave the order to kill Prigozhin are “a complete lie.”
“In addressing this issue, it is necessary to rely on the facts. There are not many facts yet. It is necessary to determine them in the course of the investigation,” Peskov said.
The United States and officials from some Western countries have said preliminary data from their intelligence services suggests that an explosion brought down the plane in which Prigozhin was a passenger, killing all 10 people on board. The detonation could have been caused by a bomb or other device placed on the plane, although other theories, such as adulterated fuel, are also being explored.
The presidential spokesman added that he could not say anything about Wagner’s future, noting that Wagner has no formal legal existence in Russia, though acknowledging that he has made a “great contribution” to Russia’s military campaign in Ukraine. He assured that Putin had not recently met with Prigozhin and even denied, contrary to what the Russian president had recently pointed out, that Wagner had state funding. It was when a journalist asked Peskov if Wagner would continue to receive Russian money by being registered in Belarus. “There was no government funding. This has nothing to do with being in Belarus, this is a completely different issue.”
But this summer, after the Prigozhin-led mutiny, Putin said the mercenaries had been “fully financed” by Russian authorities. He assured that from May 2022 to May 2023 they received more than 86,000 million rubles, about 840,000 euros at its current exchange rate, from the state budget.
US President Joe Biden has suggested that Putin is behind Prigozhin’s death: “It doesn’t happen much in Russia that Putin isn’t behind it.” Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov responded that these comments illustrate Washington’s contempt for diplomacy: “It is not for the US president to speak of such tragic events,” Riabkov said, according to the agency. state news TASS.
The catastrophe, which has decapitated Wagner, does not yet have an official cause: it could have been an explosion inside or outside the plane: that is, a bomb or a missile. But the precipitous drop and scattered debris, experts say, point to a sudden explosion of the plane rather than mechanical failure. The thesis of the explosion inside the device is gaining strength, according to US intelligence data.
Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko said on Friday that he was not responsible for ensuring Prigozhin’s safety despite having helped broker an end to the brief Wagner mutiny in Russia, which ended with an agreement that Prigozhin and his faithful stay on Belarusian soil. Lukashenko said that he did not suspect Putin, suggesting that the Russian leader is very careful and that this assassination was not. Prighozin’s disappearance already has direct consequences for Wagner. The oligarch’s mercenaries continue to gradually leave Belarus.
On Thursday, with an impassive face, Vladimir Putin promised that he would investigate what happened, but told the Russians that the truth would take time to be known. He offered his condolences to the family of Prigozhin, whom he described as a talented man who made mistakes. Prigozhin’s death may leave thousands of families of dead combatants pending payments, waiting for the government to clarify who will take care of those compensations.
The media have already removed the mercenary boss from their front pages. The ‘Kommersant’ newspaper, which on Thursday gave Prigozhin its cover, left the case on its inside pages on Friday. Already in the news the day after the catastrophe, the Rosiya 1 channel opened its first newscast on Thursday with Putin presiding over the anniversary ceremony of the Battle of Kursk, the destruction of Ukrainian equipment at the front, the Republican debate in the US and even fishing quotas. As BNE IntelliNews correspondent Jonny Tickle noted, “Prigozhin is buried.”
