The head of Russian Wagner mercenaries, Yevgeny Prigozhin, is featured again in a video allegedly shot in Africa, giving a speech for the first time since leading an insurgency attempt in late June. In the video broadcast on Telegram channels affiliated with the mercenary group, the leader of the company talks about growing Russia on all continents and making Africa more free. The footage shows Prigozhin in camouflage, rifle in hand, in the desert, with gunmen and a pickup truck in the distance. Independent verification of where the video was actually shot is currently not possible.
“The temperature is +50 degrees, everything is as we wish. Pmc (private military company, ed.) Wagner makes Russia bigger on all continents and makes Africa more free,” Prigozhin says in the video. “Justice and happiness for the people of Africa, we are making life a nightmare for ISIS, al-Qaeda and other thugs,” he adds. The man then states that Wagner has recruited people and that the group will “complete the set tasks”. For those who want to join the mercenaries, the video is accompanied by a phone number. The private military company is already based in Mali, where its fighters were recruited by a coup d’etat junta that overthrew the French troops and UN peacekeepers who helped the Malian army fight the Islamic rebels in 2021. Malian soldiers and their Russian partners are using violence against women and other grave human rights violations to spread terror among the population, UN sanctions monitors said in a report this month. Wagner and Mali denied this and allegations that they had executed at least 500 people in a village last year.
The group can also be found in Burkina Faso, another country where a coup has recently taken place, and is thought to be soon recruited in Niger, where US, French, German and Italian troops are currently stationed. It is part of international efforts to contain the Islamists and where a military junta seized power on July 26 using strong anti-French rhetoric in its communications. The future of Wagner and Prigozhin is unclear since the group staged a brief revolt against Russia’s defense establishment at the end of June. Vladimir Putin did not punish them, but allowed them to go to Belarus, where they also trained some regiments of Alexander Lukashenko’s army. In addition to Mali, Wagner also operates in the Central African Republic and Libya. Western countries claim it is also present in Sudan, although the group denies it.
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Source: Today IT
Karen Clayton is a seasoned journalist and author at The Nation Update, with a focus on world news and current events. She has a background in international relations, which gives her a deep understanding of the political, economic and social factors that shape the global landscape. She writes about a wide range of topics, including conflicts, political upheavals, and economic trends, as well as humanitarian crisis and human rights issues.
