Wagner fighters seen entering Belarus
A large convoy carrying fighters from the Wagner private army was spotted entering Belarus from Russia early Saturday, a monitoring group reported after Belarus’ Defense Ministry said it planned for the mercenaries and Minsk’s own armed forces to conduct joint military drills.
The independent monitoring group Belaruski Hajun, which tracks the movements of armed forces in Belarus, said that at least 60 trucks, buses and other large vehicles crossed into the Eastern European country accompanied by Belarusian police.
The group didn’t immediately provide photos or videos of the vehicles but said they had license plates from Russian-occupied areas of eastern Ukraine, where Wagner mercenaries fought alongside Russian troops until a short-lived mutiny last month.
The convoy headed toward a military base outside Osipovichi, a town 142 miles north of the Ukrainian border, Belaruski Hajun said. Satellite images analyzed by the Associated Press this month showed rows of tentlike structures that appeared to have been built at the base between June 15 and June 30.
Alexander Lukashenko, Belarus’ authoritarian president, said at the time that Minsk could use Wagner’s experience and expertise and that he had offered the fighters an “abandoned military unit” to set up camp. That same week, a leader of an anti-Lukashenko guerrilla group said that construction of a site for the mercenaries was underway near Osipovichi.
The Defense Ministry said in an online statement late Friday that it had developed a “road map” with Wagner’s management for joint training exercises by the nation’s military personnel and the private mercenaries.
On June 23, the Wagner group’s founder and leader, Yevgeny Prigozhin, ordered his fighters to leave their camps in Ukraine and head toward Moscow to demand the removal of Russia’s defense minister and General Staff chief. The mutiny rattled Russia and posed the biggest challenge to President Vladimir Putin, Prigozhin’s onetime benefactor, during his decades in power.
Lukashenko brokered a deal between Prigozhin and the Kremlin that shielded the Wagner leader and his men from prosecution, allowing Prigozhin to move to Belarus in exchange for ordering his mercenaries back to the camps.
Putin indicated Friday that he intends to maintain Wagner as a single fighting force under its existing commander, while appearing to denigrate Prigozhin. His remarks, made in an interview with Russia’s Kommersant newspaper, seemed to reflect the Kremlin’s efforts to secure the loyalty of the mercenaries, who make up some of the most capable Russian forces in Ukraine.