The Russian businessman and Vladimir Putin ally Yevgeny Prigozhin has stated that he based the Wagner mercenary group and confirmed its deployment to nations in Latin America and Africa in his first public affirmation of a hyperlink he has beforehand denied.
Prigozhin stated in an announcement from his firm that he based the group with the intention to ship fighters to Ukraine’s Donbas area in 2014. He stated: “From that second, on 1 Might 2014, a bunch of patriots was born, which later acquired the title BTG Wagner.”
Prigozhin, who turned often called “Putin’s chef” due to his Kremlin catering contracts, has beforehand denied hyperlinks with Wagner.
“I personally cleaned the outdated weapons, discovered bulletproof vests and located specialists who might assist me with this,” Prigozhin added. “These guys, heroes who defended the Syrian individuals, different individuals of Arab nations, destitute Africans and Latin Individuals have change into the pillars of our motherland.”
Prigozhin, 61, has been hit with EU and US sanctions. He has beforehand sued media retailers together with investigative web site Bellingcat, Russian information website Meduza and now-shuttered radio station Echo of Moscow for reporting his hyperlinks to Wagner.
For years, the Wagner group has been suspected of enjoying a task in realising Moscow’s abroad ambitions with the Kremlin denying any hyperlinks.
Wagner’s presence was pressured into the highlight in 2018 when the unbiased newspaper Novaya Gazeta reported that a number of Russian-speaking males who killed and mutilated a detainee on video in Syria have been Wagner fighters.
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