Putin Ally Mines Gold, Backs Military in Sudan

AL-IBEDIYYA, Sudan — In a gold-rich area 320 kilometers north of the Sudanese capital, a mysterious foreign operator dominates the business.

Locals call it “The Russian Company” — a tightly guarded plant deep in the desert that processes ore into bars of semirefined gold.

Sudanese company and government records show that the mine is part of the Wagner Group, an opaque network of Russian mercenaries, mining companies and political influence operations controlled by an ally of President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia that is expanding across a swath of Africa.

The linchpin of Wagner’s operations, according to Western officials, is Yevgeny V. Prigozhin, a Russian oligarch known as “Putin’s chef” who was indicted in America on charges of meddling in the 2016 presidential election.

Wagner has obtained Sudanese mining concessions, records show, a potential boost to the Kremlin’s $130 billion gold stash that American officials worry is being used to blunt the effect of economic sanctions over the Ukraine war.

In eastern Sudan, Wagner is supporting the Kremlin’s push to build a naval base on the Red Sea. In western Sudan, it has found a launchpad for its mercenary operations in neighboring countries, and a possible source of uranium.

And since Sudan’s military seized power in a coup in October, Wagner has intensified its partnership with a power-hungry commander, Lieutenant General Mohamed Hamdan, helping Sudan’s security forces suppress a pro-democracy movement, Western officials say.

The Kremlin and Mr. Prigozhin deny any links to Wagner. But the U.S. Treasury Department and experts say that he owns or controls most, if not all, of the companies that make up Wagner. In a written response to questions, Mr. Prigozhin denied any mining interests in Sudan, denounced American sanctions against him and rejected the existence of the Wagner Group.

Wagner’s operations in Sudan began in 2017. President Omar Hassan al-Bashir of Sudan was losing his grip on power. At a meeting with Mr. Putin in Sochi, Russia, he proposed Sudan as Russia’s “key to Africa” in return for help, according to a Kremlin transcript. Mr. Putin snapped up the offer.

Within weeks, Russian geologists and mineralogists employed by Meroe Gold, a new Sudanese company, began to arrive in Sudan, according to flight records obtained by the Dossier Center, a London-based investigative body, and verified by the Center for Advanced Defense Studies.

The U.S. Treasury Department says that Meroe Gold is controlled by Mr. Prigozhin, and it imposed sanctions on the company in 2020.

A week after Mr. al-Bashir was ousted by his own generals in April 2019, Mr. Prigozhin’s jet arrived in Sudan’s capital, Khartoum, carrying Russian military officials. It returned to Moscow with Sudanese defense officials, according to flight data obtained by the Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta.

Six weeks later, on June 3, 2019, General Hamdan’s troops launched an operation to disperse protesters from central Khartoum in which at least 120 people were killed. On June 5, Meroe Gold imported riot gear for a company controlled by General Hamdan’s family, customs and company documents show.

Several protests against Meroe Gold have erupted in mining areas.

“Russia supported the coup,” read a poster in Khartoum recently, “so it could steal our gold.”