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Yevgeny V. Prigozhin, the founding father of the Wagner mercenary group who staged an aborted mutiny in opposition to Russia’s navy management in June, in one of the dramatic challenges to President Vladimir V. Putin’s rule in many years, was listed as a passenger on a airplane that crashed on Wednesday in Russia, killing everybody on board, the nation’s aviation authorities stated.
Mr. Prigozhin’s destiny was not instantly identified. A passenger manifest launched by the Russian authorities confirmed his identify and that of Wagner’s prime commander, Dmitri Utkin, among the many seven passengers and three crew members. And Gray Zone, a Telegram account related to the Wagner group, stated that Mr. Prigozhin had been killed. However there was no official affirmation of his demise from Wagner or the Russian authorities.
Russia’s aviation authority supplied no touch upon the rationale for the crash, and introduced that it had created a particular fee to research “the circumstances and causes of the accident.”
Mr. Prigozhin, a catering entrepreneur turned outspoken tycoon who constructed the non-public Wagner paramilitary pressure that has fought on Russia’s behalf in Ukraine and throughout Africa, instigated the revolt together with his Wagner forces after railing for months in audio and video clips in opposition to Russia’s navy leaders.
He complained publicly and profanely that they had been incompetents and back-stabbers, and that Wagner deserved credit score for battlefield successes in Mr. Putin’s conflict in Ukraine. In launching the mutiny, he insisted, nevertheless, that he was not aiming at Mr. Putin, however relatively on the protection minister, Sergei Okay. Shoigu, and Russia’s prime uniformed navy officers, who he stated had been bungling the conflict.
In a shocking transfer, Wagner’s fighters took over the Russian metropolis of Rostov-on-Don and started a march on Moscow in June, riveting the world. However simply as abruptly because it began, the mutiny was referred to as off by Mr. Prigozhin, who agreed to withdraw from Rostov-on-Don below a deal that might supposedly drop any costs and permit Mr. Prigozhin and fighters loyal to him to decamp for neighboring Belarus.
The Kremlin launched what many analysts thought-about a low-key crackdown in response to the mutiny. However many observers speculated that Mr. Prigozhin’s betrayal was tantamount to a demise sentence.
American officers stated they might not verify Mr. Prigozhin had been killed within the airplane crash, or why the jet went down.
When requested if he thought Mr. Putin was behind the airplane crash, President Biden responded: “There’s not a lot that occurs in Russia that Putin’s not behind. However I don’t know sufficient to know the reply.”
The airplane crash occurred solely hours after Russian state media reported a separate, public blow in opposition to one other determine suspected of being related to the mutiny: Gen. Sergei Surovikin, a former commander who helped shore up Russia’s defenses in Ukraine, was faraway from his submit because the chief of Russia’s Air Pressure.
Analysts have described Common Surovikin — referred to as “Common Armageddon” for his ruthless ways — as a brutally efficient chief in a Russian navy that even many cheerleaders of the conflict have described as riddled with incompetence. However his hyperlinks to Mr. Prigozhin appeared to precipitate his fall from grace.
American officers stated the overall had advance data of the Wagner revolt, and he has not been seen in public for the reason that mutiny. The Russian information company RIA Novosti reported on Wednesday that he “is now on a brief trip.”
Col. Gen. Viktor Afzalov, chief of the Air Pressure’s basic workers, was named the performing commander, it reported.
Even after the mutiny, Mr. Prigozhin, 62, appeared to maneuver about freely in latest weeks, and even met with Mr. Putin on the Kremlin on June 29. On Monday, Mr. Prigozhin launched a quick video message on-line, hinting that he was in Africa, though the video recording’s timing and placement had been unclear. Wearing fatigues and holding an assault rifle, he stated that Wagner was “making Russia even higher, on all continents, and Africa much more free.”
Regardless of the uncertainty across the airplane crash and Mr. Prigozhin’s destiny, U.S. intelligence businesses stated they’d been stunned that Mr. Putin had not but taken motion in opposition to the Wagner chief after his mutiny.
In July, William J. Burns, the C.I.A. director, stated {that a} “difficult dance” with Mr. Putin had developed. Mr. Prigozhin traveled between Russia and Belarus, the place President Aleksandr G. Lukashenko had supplied Mr. Prigozhin and his fighters refuge, and different places. However Mr. Burns predicted that Mr. Putin would transfer in opposition to Mr. Prigozhin.
“Putin is somebody who typically thinks that revenge is a dish finest served chilly,” Mr. Burns stated on the Aspen Safety Discussion board in Colorado final month. “So he’s going to attempt to settle the state of affairs to the extent he can. However, once more, in my expertise, Putin is the last word apostle of payback. So I might be stunned if Prigozhin escapes additional retribution for this.”
The airplane that listed Mr. Prigozhin as a passenger on Wednesday left Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport about 6 p.m. native time, certain for St. Petersburg. It went down lower than 100 miles to the northwest, close to town of Tver. RIA Novosti posted an unconfirmed video, broadly shared on social media, that purports to point out the airplane tumbling from the sky, smoke billowing.
Video shared on the Telegram messaging app appeared to point out the plane burning on the bottom. The paint and a partial registration quantity, RA-02795, seen on the plane within the video, an Embraer Legacy 600 enterprise jet, align with a jet that Mr. Prigozhin is thought to make use of.
Ten our bodies had been recovered on the crash website, RIA Novosti reported, citing Russian Emergency Companies officers. The state tv channel Rossiya-24 cited the authorities as saying that seven passengers and three crew members had been on the airplane.
Mr. Putin didn’t remark instantly on the crash. Across the time the information broke, Russian tv broadcast stay footage of his look within the Kursk area to honor the eightieth anniversary of the Soviet Union’s victory over Nazi Germany.
“I heartily congratulate all residents of Russia on this occasion,” Mr. Putin stated whereas standing onstage in entrance of an orchestra.
Officers in Ukraine, which has suffered steep losses of life and has seen villages, cities and cities devastated by Mr. Putin’s 18-month conflict, had been additionally cautious about saying precisely what had occurred. However Andriy Yermak, the pinnacle of the president’s workplace, posted what gave the impression to be a thinly veiled reference to the crash on his Telegram account: an audio hyperlink to the tune “Freeway to Hell.”
A spokeswoman for the U.S. Nationwide Safety Council, Adrienne Watson, stated that if Mr. Prigozhin’s demise was confirmed, “nobody must be stunned.” She added, “The disastrous conflict in Ukraine led to a personal military marching on Moscow, and now, it might appear, to this.”
Some Russian bloggers and different pro-Moscow voices warned in opposition to concluding that Mr. Prigozhin was lifeless, a lot much less that he had been killed intentionally. The professional-war Russian navy weblog Arkhangel Spetsnaz urged its greater than 900,000 followers on Telegram to “depart all conjectures and investigations for later.” The submit added, “The enemy takes benefit of each destabilizing state of affairs.”
However Gray Zone, the weblog near the Wagner group, reported that Mr. Prigozhin and Mr. Utkin, his prime commander, had been killed.
Mr. Prigozhin “died because of the actions of traitors of Russia,” a submit by Gray Zone stated. “However even in hell, he would be the finest!”
Reporting was contributed by Valerie Hopkins, Paul Sonne, Riley Mellen, Eric Schmitt, Erica L. Inexperienced, Julian E. Barnes and Cassandra Vinograd.
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