The Russian authorities today continued the investigation into the accident of the plane, in which, according to the official version, the Head of the Wagner Group, Yevgeny Prigozhin, As speculation mounts about the incident that beheaded the mercenary company.
Although even the Russian President Vladimir Putin left Prigozhin for dead as he offered condolences on Wagner boss’s death, To date, his death has not been legally confirmed by DNA testing, which was required by the condition of the bodies of those on board the plane that crashed on Wednesday.
The Identification through comparative analysis of genetic material could take several dayssince it depends on the delivery of samples from the direct relatives of the deceased, coroner Vladimir Skakun explained to the digital Fontanka.ru.
Lukashenko warned Prigozhin
The President of Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko, who acted as a facilitator in cracking down on the Wagner mutiny last June against the Russian military leadership said Friday he had warned Prigozhin through Putin that he had information that an attack against him was being prepared. Lukashenko added that the Wagner boss later confirmed that he had received the notice.
Exactly The detonation of an explosive device in the landing gear compartment of Prigozhin’s aircraft, an Embraer Legacy 600, is considered a possible cause of the accident.
Some media pointed to the possibility The plane could be shot downintentionally or accidentally, by missiles from air defense units protecting a Putin residence that was off the route Prigozhin’s plane had taken.
The Russian authorities also do not rule out a technical defect or even pilot error as the cause of the accident, while there is no shortage of people on social networks who claim that everything is just a game and that Prigozhin is alive.
In any case, the Kremlin flatly rejected the allegations by the opposition and the statements by Western politicians that Putin was behind the Prigozhin plane crash. “It’s an absolute lie. stressed the spokesman of the Russian Presidency, Dmitry Peskov.
Putin does not forgive traitors
Many media outlets recall that when describing the Wagner uprising in a television message to the population on the same day, June 24, Putin declared that he did not condone betrayal. After the agreement that ended the uprising of the mercenaries and provided for their transfer to Belarus, the Wagner group was deprived of its heavy weapons.
And now, with the crash of the Prigozhin plane, the mercenary company is left headless, as its most prominent commander was Dmitri Utkin, whose codename “Wagner” was adopted for the entire group, which he co-founded and fly with him.
Former Officer ofto the Russian Military Intelligence Service (GRU), Utkin fought in Chechnya, Syria and Ukraine and was awarded the title of Hero of Russia. In one of the few known photos of him, he appears with a shaved head and various Nazi tattoos.
Among the ten occupants of the damaged Embraer Legacy 600 was Valeri Chekalov, who is responsible for Prigozhin’s personal safety and part of his business and was recently sanctioned by the United States.
The Wagners will continue in Belarus
Lukashenko assured that the Wagner Group mercenaries will remain in Belarus, where they settled after their uprising failed. “Wagner lives and will live in Belarus, no matter how much some don’t want him,” said the president, quoted by the official Belarusian news agency BELTA.
He downplayed satellite images showing that Wagner’s camp in the Mogilev region of eastern Belarus had shrunk. “In a few days everyone will be here, around 10,000 people,” he emphasized, pointing out that some Wagnerians are currently “on vacation”.
