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"It has been weakened forever by this affair"/ The questions about Putin's power raised by Prigozhin's revolt

2023-06-25 19:36:23Kosova&Bota SHKRUAR NGA REDAKSIA VOX
"It has been weakened forever by this affair"/ The questions about
The questions about Putin's power raised by Prigozhin's revolt

Russian President Vladimir Putin's biggest challenge in his more than two decades in power has faded after the mercenary commander of the Wagner Group, who ordered his troops to march on Moscow, suddenly struck a deal with the Kremlin to go into exile and ordered his troops to withdraw.

The brief revolt, however, exposed the weaknesses of the Russian government forces, as the fighters of the Wagner group under the command of Yevgeny Prigozhin were able to move unhindered into the Russian city of Rostov-on-Don and advance hundreds of kilometers towards Moscow. The Russian army was mobilized to defend the capital of Russia.

Under the deal announced Saturday by Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, Prigozhin will go to neighboring Belarus, which has supported Russia's aggression in Ukraine. Charges against him for armed insurrection will be dropped.

The government also said it would not prosecute Wagner group fighters who took part, while those who did not join the uprising would be offered contracts by the defense ministry. Prigozhin ordered his troops back to their field camps in Ukraine, where they have been fighting alongside regular Russian soldiers.

President Putin vowed on Saturday morning to punish those behind the armed uprising led by his one-time favorite. In a televised address to the nation, he called the uprising a "treason".

Allowing Prigozhin and his forces to leave, spokesman Peskov said, was Putin's "higher goal" to "avoid bloodshed and internal confrontation with unpredictable consequences."

The risk for Putin is if he is seen as weak, analysts say.

"Putin has been weakened forever by this affair," former US ambassador to Ukraine John Herbst told CNN.

Moscow prepared to confront the forces of the Wagner group by setting up checkpoints with armored vehicles and troops in the southern part of the city. About 3,000 Chechen soldiers were withdrawn from fighting in Ukraine and rushed there early Saturday, state television in Chechnya reported. Russian troops armed with machine guns set up checkpoints on the southern outskirts of Moscow, while sections of highways were dug up to slow the march.

Wagner's troops advanced to within 200 kilometers of Moscow, according to Prigozhin. But after the agreement was reached, he announced that he had decided to withdraw to avoid "bloodshed".

Prigozhin had called for the dismissal of Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, whom he has long criticized with disdain for leading the 16-month war in Ukraine. On Friday, he accused forces under the command of Minister Shoigu of attacking Wagner's camps, killing "a large number of our comrades".

If President Putin accepted the ouster of Minister Shoigu, it would be politically damaging for him as he branded Prigozhin a backstabbing traitor.

American intelligence services had information that Prigozhin had been massing his forces near the Russian border for some time. This contradicts Prigozhin's claim that his uprising was in response to an attack on his camps in Ukraine on Friday by the Russian military.

In announcing the uprising, Prigozhin accused Russian forces of attacking the Wagner group's camps in Ukraine with rockets, helicopters and artillery. He claimed that General Valery Gerasimov, chief of the General Staff, ordered the attacks after a meeting with Minister Shoigu in which they decided to destroy the group.

The Ministry of Defense denied attacking the camps.

Congressional leaders were informed of the Wagner group's troop buildup early last week, said a person familiar with the matter who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity. The announcement of the American intelligence was first reported by the CNN network.

A possible motive for Prigozhin's rebellion was the defense ministry's demand, which President Putin supported, that private companies sign contracts with it by July 1. Prigozhin had refused to do so.

"It is possible that he struck now because he saw that deadline as a threat to his control of the troops," Ambassador Herbst wrote in an article for the Atlantic Council.

Early on Saturday, Prigozhin's private army appeared to be in control of the military headquarters in Rostov-on-Don, a city about 1,000 kilometers south of Moscow, from where Russian operations in Ukraine are directed, the British Ministry of Defense said.

Russian media reported that several helicopters and a military plane were shot down by Wagner troops. The Russian Ministry of Defense has not commented on the announcements.

After the deal eased tensions, videos posted on Russian social media showed people cheering for Wagner's troops as they left. Prigozhin was riding in an SUV followed by a truck and the crowd greeted him and some ran to shake his hand. The regional governor later said all troops had left the city.

Wagner's troops and equipment were also seen in Lipetsk province, about 360 kilometers south of Moscow.

Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin declared Monday a non-working day for most residents as part of heightened security measures, a measure that remained in place even after Wagner's withdrawal.

Ukrainians hoped that Russian infighting would allow their army to retake territories seized by Russian forces.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said late Saturday, shortly before Prigozhin announced his withdrawal, that the march exposed the Kremlin's weakness and "showed all Russian thugs, mercenaries, oligarchs" that it is easy to capture Russian cities "and, perhaps , the arsenals".

Wagner troops have played a decisive role in the Ukrainian war, capturing the eastern city of Bakhmut, an area where the bloodiest and longest battles have been fought. But Prigozhin has increasingly criticized the army leadership, accusing it of incompetence and a lack of ammunition for his troops.

Yevgeny Prigozhin, 62, an ex-convict, has long ties to President Putin and won lucrative food contracts from the Kremlin that earned him the nickname "Putin's chef".

He and a dozen other Russian nationals have been charged in the United States with a campaign of meddling before Mr. Donald Trump's victory in the 2016 presidential election. Wagner has sent military contractors to Libya, Syria, several African countries and eventually Ukraine. . / Associated Press/VOA


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