he leader of the Wagner private military group in Russia has called for an armed rebellion against the military leadership in Russia.
Yevgeny Prigozhin posted a series of angry video and audio recordings in which he accused Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu of ordering a deadly rocket strike Friday on Wagner‘s field camps in Ukraine, where his troops are fighting on behalf of Russia.
Mr Prigozhin said his troops would now punish Shoigu in an armed rebellion and urged the army not to offer resistance but he has has denied he is attempting a coup.
The military leader said he and his troops have reached the city of Rostov-on-Don after crossing the Russian border from Ukraine.
He claimed that his forces had military facilities in the city under their control, including the airfield and posted video in which he says Wagner forces will continue to blockade the city and move on to Moscow unless defence chiefs Sergei Shoigu and Valery Gerasimov come and meet him.
Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said on Saturday that anti-terrorist measures were being taken in the Russian capital, including additional checks on roads, to reinforce security. The Kremlin has ordered Prigozhin’s arrest, and he is being investigated for inciting mutiny.
President Vladimir Putin is due to address the nation.
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Russian mercenary chief ‘seizes Russian city of Rostov-on-Don’
Wagner leader Yevgeny Prigozhin said on Saturday he had taken control of the Russian city of Rostov-on-Don as part of an attempt to oust the military leadership amid what the authorities said was an armed mutiny.
Prigozhin demanded that Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu and Valery Gerasimov, the chief of the General Staff, whom he has pledged to oust over what he says is their disastrous leadership of the war against Ukraine, come to see him in Rostov, a city near the Ukrainian border.
He had earlier said that he had 25,000 fighters moving towards Moscow to “restore justice” and had alleged, without providing evidence, that the military had killed a huge number of fighters from his Wagner private militia in an air strike, something the defence ministry denied.
“Those who destroyed our lads, who destroyed the lives of many tens of thousands of Russian soldiers, will be punished. I ask that no one offer resistance…,” he said in one of many frenzied audio messages.
“There are 25,000 of us and we are going to figure out why chaos is happening in the country,” he said, promising to destroy any checkpoints or air forces that got in Wagner’s way.
Zelensky adviser on Wagner operation: ‘Everything is just beginning in Russia’
A senior aide to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky described the actions by Russian mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin as a “counter-terrorist operation” and said that “everything is just beginning in Russia”.
“The split between the elites is too obvious. Agreeing and pretending that everything is settled won’t work,” Mykhailo Podolyak tweeted on Saturday.
“Someone must definitely lose: either Prigozhin…or the collective ‘anti-Prygozhin’,” he added.
“Everything is just beginning in Russia.”
Russian mercenary boss says troops willing to go ‘all the way’ in rebellion
Russian mercenary boss Yevgeny Prigozhin said on Saturday his Wagner fighters had crossed the border into Russia from Ukraine and were prepared to go “all the way” against Moscow’s military, hours after the Kremlin accused him of armed mutiny.
As a long-running standoff between Prigozhin and the military top brass appeared to come to a head, Russia’s FSB security service opened a criminal case against him, TASS news agency said. It called on the Wagner private military company forces to ignore his orders and arrest him.
Wagner fighters had entered the southern Russian city of Rostov, Prigozhin said in an audio recording posted on Telegram. He said he and his men would destroy anyone who stood in their way. Prigozhin earlier said, without providing evidence, that Russia’s military leadership had killed a huge number of his troops in an air strike and vowed to punish them.
He said his actions were not a military coup. But in a frenzied series of audio messages, in which the sound of his voice sometimes varied and could not be independently verified, he appeared to suggest that his 25,000-strong militia was en route to oust the leadership of the defence ministry in Moscow.
Security was stepped up on Friday night at government buildings, transport facilities and other key locations in Moscow, TASS reported, citing a source at a security service.
