The leader of the Wagner group, Yevgeny Prigozhinhas assured in a message published this Monday that the mutiny that his forces staged over the weekend had no intention of overthrowing the Russian government and demonstrated the weaknesses of Russian security.
In his first remarks since he was last seen smiling in the back of a jeep as he withdrew from a city occupied by his men on Saturday night, Prigozhin has claimed his fighters canceled their mission to avoid bloodshed. .
“We went as a protest demonstration, not to overthrow the country’s government,” Prigozhin explains in an 11-minute audio message posted on the Telegram messaging app. “Our march showed many things that we discussed before: the serious security problems in the country,” he adds.
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He has made no reference to his current location, two days after saying he was leaving belarus under an agreement negotiated by the president of that country to put an end to their mutiny.
Prigozhin shocked the world by leading the armed mutiny only to call it off abruptly as his fighters neared the capital after running nearly 1,000 km.