A few days before the fatal fall of his plane, northwest of Moscow, the leader of the Wagner militia was still traveling the world to try to save his future, says a nice article from the Wall Street Journal. The Friday before his death, Evgueni Prigojine had thus landed in Bangui, the capital of the Central African Republic, to discuss with President Touadéra and his head of the secret services, Wanzet Linguissara.
The warlord would thus have tried to assure his partner of the strength of their ties, saying that he could bring new fighters and investments to his trading partners in Central Africa, despite the failed rebellion… And this, despite the fact that Vladimir Putin personally asked his counterpart to distance himself from him. Sergei Shoigu, Russian Minister of Defense and great rival of Prigojine, would have sent delegations to carry this message to the various governments of the “Wagner countries”; which could, moreover, explain the apparent reluctance of the Nigerien putschists on the matter.
After his meeting with Touadéra, Evgueni Prigojine would then, according to the newspaper, have recovered in Bangui a shipment of gold from Darfur, brought by five commanders of the Rapid Support Forces of Sudan, a paramilitary group supported by Wagner. A payment, in exchange for Prigojine’s recent supply of surface-to-air missiles to the rebels.
Prigojine then made a stopover in Bamako, Mali, according to flight logs from a private jet he used frequently to criss-cross the continent. To leave soon for his final trip to Russia, completing an intense activity started in June between the Middle East, Africa and Eastern Europe to try to maintain, without success, his influence and his achievements.