Prigozhin, head of Wagner, dies in plane crash
Yevgeny Prigozhin, leader of the Wagner Group mercenaries, has died after the plane he was travelling in crashed in Tver oblast, northwest of Moscow. According to the Russian Federal Air Transport Agency (Rosaviatsiya), three crew members and seven passengers were on board the aircraft - Prigozhin's private jet - which crashed near the town of Kuzhenkino.
The agency also published a list of passengers that includes the 62-year-old Prigozhin himself and his allies from the Wagner group. Channels affiliated with the mercenary group also confirmed the death of their leader. The accounts linked to Wagner also mention the death of Dmitry Utkin, one of the founders of the private company Wagner, who was also on the plane.
A video shared by Russian online news publication Mash on Telegram on Aug. 23 shows the crash site of Wagner Group's boss Yevgeny Prigozhin’s private plane in Russia's Tver Oblast.
— The Kyiv Independent (@KyivIndependent) August 23, 2023
Video: Russian online news publication Mash / Telegram pic.twitter.com/Ju0RckTGDE
According to Russian authorities, the plane crashed while flying from Moscow to St Petersburg, although the Wagner-linked Telegram channel Gray Zone has claimed that the aircraft was shot down by the Russian army. Others say it may have been the victim of a bomb attack, which was shot down by a high-altitude drone or by Russian anti-aircraft defence.
This accident comes months after Prigozhin led a mutiny against Moscow. At the time, Russian President Vladimir Putin called the rebellion "treason" and a "stab in the back" and vowed to avenge it. However, the Wagner leader ceased his uprising against the Kremlin and the Russian authorities dropped the charges.
Shortly afterwards, he went into exile in Belarus along with other mercenaries who began training the country's forces. Recently, a video was released of Prigozhin at a location in Africa, where he was to make Russia "bigger on all continents".
However, since the mutiny, Prigozhin has been in the crosshairs of Putin, who is known for not sparing critical voices against the Kremlin. Christo Grozev, a Bellingcat investigative journalist specialising in Russia, recently gave an interview to The Financial Times in which he claimed that Wagner's boss would be dead within six months. "Putin called Prigozhin a traitor on television. Everyone knows what you do with 'traitors' and Putin hasn't done that. He wants to see him dead. In six months Prigozhin will be dead or there will be a second strike," he said.
All the bodies of those who died as a result of the crash of #Prigozhin's plane were taken out of the crash site and sent to the morgue for a forensic medical examination.
— NEXTA (@nexta_tv) August 24, 2023
Before the fall, the Embraer plane lost 2.4 km of altitude in 30 seconds. Prior to this, there had been no… pic.twitter.com/TWroD7jFg0
Even senior US officials, including President Joe Biden himself and Secretary of State Antony Blinken, have referred to Putin's retaliation against Prigozhin after his uprising last June.
After learning of the accident, Biden said he was "not surprised". "Few things happen in Russia without Putin having something to do with it," he said. French government spokesman Oliver Veran also said in an interview with national public television that "one can have logical doubts" about what happened. However, Veran stressed that Progozhin "leaves behind him cemeteries and a terrible mess in a large part of the world", recalling that he was "Putin's dirty jobs man".
About Prigozhin: It is worth waiting for the fog of war to disappear... Meanwhile, it is obvious that Putin does not forgive anyone for his own bestial terror. Exactly the one that nullified him in June 2023. And he was waiting for the moment. It is also obvious that Prigozhin…
— Михайло Подоляк (@Podolyak_M) August 23, 2023
Ukraine, a long-time victim of Progozhin and his mercenaries, has also spoken out. "The elimination of Prigozhin and the Wagner commando two months after the coup attempt is a signal from Putin to the Russian elites ahead of the 2024 elections. 'Beware! Disloyalty is tantamount to death'," Mykhaylo Podolyak, a senior adviser to the Ukrainian presidency, wrote on social media.
