From BZ/afp
According to the Kremlin, Russian President Vladimir Putin met with their boss Yevgeny Prigozhin a few days after the failed uprising of the Russian mercenary group Wagner.
The meeting with 35 participants took place in the Kremlin on June 29 and lasted “almost three hours”, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Monday.
“The President has given his assessment of the events of June 24,” Peskov said, referring to the day Wagner mercenaries occupied the Russian army headquarters in Rostov-on-Don in south-western Russia for several hours and then headed for Moscow were advanced. According to the Kremlin, the uprising ended the same evening with an agreement that Prigozhin should go into exile in Belarus.
At the meeting in the Kremlin, Putin “listened to the statements made by the Wagner commanders and offered them alternatives for their future work and use for military purposes,” the spokesman for the Russian president said.
The commanders would have presented their version of events. “They stressed that they are staunch supporters and soldiers of the Head of State and Commander-in-Chief (Vladimir Putin) and reiterated that they are ready to continue fighting for the Fatherland,” Peskov said.
Earlier, the French newspaper Liberation, citing Western intelligence sources, reported that Prigozhin and his commanders were being detained in the Kremlin after a summons.
A good two weeks after the attempted uprising, there is still considerable uncertainty about the fate of the Wagner troops. Some Wagner fighters are said to have signed contracts with the regular Russian army in the meantime, while others are said to have been exiled to Belarus. According to Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko on Thursday, Wagner boss Prigozhin is not in Belarus but in Russia.