Wagner boss, Yevgeny Prigozhin was allegedly on the passenger list of a plane, which crashed in Russia, killing all 10 on board. He was believed to be on board the plane. Earlier, a Wagner-linked Telegram channel Grey Zone reported that the jet was shot down by air defences in Tver region, north of Moscow. Prigozhin led a failed mutiny against the Russian armed forces in June.
Authorities are investigating the cause of the crash, which occurred exactly two months after Prigozhin led his fighters in a short-lived mutiny against Russia’s military leadership. “There’s not much that happens in Russia that [Russian President] Putin’s not behind. But I don’t know enough to know the answer,” US President Joe Biden said in reaction to the news.
Ukraine presidential aide Mykhailo Podolyak said the plane crash was “a signal from Putin to Russia’s elites ahead of the 2024 elections. ‘Beware! Disloyalty equals death.’”
Questions are now being raised about the future of thousands of Wagner fighters deployed in Africa, Belarus and elsewhere.
