Russia’s Putin Moves to Dismantle Wagner Paramilitary Group

livemint.com:

Russian President Vladimir Putin said the Wagner paramilitary group led by Yevgeny Prigozhin “simply doesn’t exist," as he moves to dismantle an organization that was critical to Moscow’s war effort in Ukraine before it turned on the Russian establishment in a short-lived mutiny last month. Putin’s comments, in an interview published late Thursday in Russian newspaper Kommersant, came days after Russia’s Defense Ministry said it had taken control of Wagner tanks, artillery and guns after its involvement in the biggest challenge to Putin in his 23 years in power.

At the same time, the Kremlin has sought to keep Wagner troops in the fight in Ukraine. Putin told Kommersant that he had called a meeting with Prigozhin and Wagner unit commanders days after the mutiny to discuss “employment options" for fighters.

“Ordinary Wagner fighters fought with dignity," Putin in the interview. “The fact that they were involved in these events is regrettable." During the insurrection, Wagner occupied the headquarters of the Southern Military District in the southern Russian city of Rostov and a column including armored vehicles and air-defense systems set out for Moscow but stopped before reaching the Russian capital.

Prigozhin agreed to go into exile in Belarus. The demolition of Wagner ends one of Moscow’s most daring experiments with a shadow force that provided Moscow with footholds in Africa and the Middle East as Wagner troops fought faraway wars on the side of Putin’s allies.

Private military companies are illegal in Russia, and Wagner operated for years in a gray area, engaging in shadowy operations while providing the Kremlin’s plausible deniability. The Kremlin’s security forces have led a crackdown on Wagner’s sympathizers