TheJakartaPost
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
'Highly likely' Wagner boss Prigozhin dead but no definitive proof yet: UK
Russian authorities have said Prigozhin was listed as a passenger on the plane which fell from the sky northwest of Moscow on Wednesday evening, two months to the day after he led an abortive mutiny against the army top brass.
Change Size
This handout video grab taken from a footage posted on April 6, 2023 on the Telegram account of the press-service of Concord -- a company linked to the chief of Russian mercenary group Wagner, Yevgeny Prigozhin -- shows Yevgeny Prigozhin at a cemetery for fallen PMC Wagner fighters in the settlement of Goryachiy Klyuch in the southern Russian Krasnodar region. (AFP/Handout)
T
here is not yet definitive proof that Wagner mercenary boss Yevgeny Prigozhin was onboard a plane that crashed with no survivors earlier this week but it is "highly likely" he is dead, Britain's Ministry of Defence said on Friday.
Russian authorities have said Prigozhin was listed as a passenger on the plane which fell from the sky northwest of Moscow on Wednesday evening, two months to the day after he led an abortive mutiny against the army top brass.
Russian investigators have opened a probe into what happened, but have not officially confirmed the identities of the 10 bodies recovered from the wreckage.
"There is not yet definitive proof that Prigozhin was onboard and he is known to exercise exceptional security measures. However, it is highly likely that he is indeed dead," the British ministry said in a defence intelligence update posted on social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter.
"The demise of Prigozhin would almost certainly have a deeply destabilising effect on the Wagner Group. His personal attributes of hyper-activity, exceptional audacity, a drive for results and extreme brutality permeated Wagner and are unlikely to be matched by any successor."
"Wagner's leadership vacuum would be compounded by the reports that founder and field commander Dimitry Utkin and logistics chief Valery Chekalov also died."
