The fate of the Wagner Group, the mercenary company behind Vladimir Putin’s murkiest operations from Africa to Ukraine, is in doubt after Russian authorities said that its founder, Yevgeny Prigozhin, was on a private jet that crashed, killing all aboard.
The crash over Russian territory occurred exactly two months after Prigozhin led his fighters on an abortive mutiny that posed the greatest threat to Putin’s near quarter-century rule.Founded by Prigozhin in 2014, Wagner is a private military company that supported Kremlin objectives on battlefields in Ukraine, the Middle East, Latin America and Africa, where it’s been accused of committing human rights abuses.
The US designated the group as a transnational criminal organization earlier this year, and Wagner has been sanctioned by Australia, Canada, Japan, the UK and the European Union. The group is also linked to lucrative oil, gold and other businesses in some countries where it operates outside Russia.The Wagner fighters that came within 200 kilometers of the Kremlin and killed at least 13 Russian pilots on their march avoided punishment under a deal that saw them dramatically turn back. Some, including Prigozhin himself, then relocated to neighboring Belarus, whose leader helped broker the deal to end the mutiny.
The mercenary group was also allowed to keep most of its extensive and profitable operations in Africa, where it played a key role in extending the Kremlin’s influence on a shoestring, sometimes offering military services in return for access to mineral resources.It’s unclear because some of Progozhin’s top lieutenants were also on the plane, leaving a major void at the top of the organization.
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