11/21/2023 0 Comments Dcommander in chief twitterWagner’s African presence may become even more important for Russia now, as Moscow’s other geopolitical tools on the continent dwindle. In Sudan and CAR, Wagner also oversees gold mining and smuggling operations that help the Kremlin evade western sanctions. Wagner forces prop up dictators and warlords in Central African Republic (CAR), Mali and Libya who now depend on Moscow for their survival. Wagner’s willingness to fight in Africa allows Russia to avoid having its regular troops suffer casualties that might anger the Russian public. Prigozhin’s contracts with foreign leaders probably make Wagner’s actions there self-financing. The Wagner group is a low-cost lever for Russian influence in Africa. Last week those accounts showed Prigozhin hobnobbing with diplomats on the sidelines of Russia’s Africa summit in St Petersburg, and aired his offer to help support the coup in Niger. The Kremlin shuttered Prigozhin’s media empire, but Russian social media accounts linked to him are still functioning. Yet authorities returned almost £85m to him through his driver, according to Fontanka, an online St Petersburg newspaper. Russian state television broadcast an embarrassing security service raid on Prigozhin’s St Petersburg properties, with commentators again calling him a traitor and criminal. Yet weeks later Prigozhin was shown at the Belarusian camp exhorting Wagner forces to prepare for future African deployments. Putin initially stated that the mutiny’s perpetrators were treasonous, criminal terrorists who would be “brought to account”. But these events may sap Russian military morale in Ukraine, while causing powerful members of Putin’s inner circle to doubt the president’s authority and competence. It is therefore impossible to make predictions with any degree of confidence. The situation is fluid, and many reports and images emerging from Russia cannot be verified. Meanwhile, Shoigu and Gerasimov remain in office. Several thousand Wagner forces have instead congregated in neighbouring Belarus, fulfilling the mutiny-ending deal negotiated by the Belarusian president, Alexander Lukashenko. In the wake of these incidents, President Putin seems neither to have disbanded the Wagner group nor to have got rid of Prigozhin, although authorities did confiscate the mutineers’ heavy weapons. Wagner forces shot down six helicopters and an aeroplane, killing 13 Russian military pilots, and severely damaged buildings, roads and an oil refinery. Wagner occupied Russia’s war headquarters in Rostov-on-Don, and sent a vehicle convoy to within 125 miles (200km) of Moscow.
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