Prigozhin’s final months a mystery
Last days of brutal mercenary leader shrouded in silence
TALLINN, Estonia — Yevgeny Prigozhin smiled as a crowd of adoring fans surrounded his black SUV on June 24 in Russia’s southern city of Rostov-on-Don and cheered him on.
“You rock!” fans shouted while taking selfies with the chief of the Wagner mercenary group, who was sitting in the vehicle after nightfall. “You’re a lion! Hang in there!”
Prigozhin and his masked, camouflage-clad fighters were leaving the city after a daylong mutiny against the country’s military leadership. President Vladimir Putin decried it as “treason” and vowed punishment, but then he cut a deal not to prosecute Prigozhin. Beyond that, his fate looked uncertain.
Two months later, on Aug. 23, Prigozhin’s business jet plummeted from the sky and crashed in a field halfway between Moscow and St. Petersburg. All 10 people on board the plane were killed, Russian authorities said. Russia’s Investigative Committee said Sunday that forensic testing confirmed Prigozhin was one of them.
The two scenes, which unfolded just two months apart, provide bookends to the mystery-shrouded final days of the outspoken, brutal mercenary leader who initially appeared to have escaped any retribution for the rebellion that posed the greatest challenge to Putin’s authority in his 23-year rule.
Suspicions immediately arose that the crash of the plane, which also carried some of the Wagner founder’s top lieutenants, was a Kremlin act of vengeance. The Kremlin denied it.
In on-camera remarks eulogizing Prigozhin, the Russian president sought to show that there was no bad blood between them. He described the head of Wagner as “a talented man” whom he had known for a long time and who made “serious mistakes” but was still apparently doing business with the government.
The last weeks of Prigozhin’s life were overshadowed by questions about what the Kremlin really had in store for him. Had he already dodged a bullet? Or was his comeuppance just further down the road?
Shortly before footage emerged of Prigozhin driving off into the night in Rostov-on-Don, the Kremlin announced a deal to end the mutiny. Prigozhin would “retreat to Belarus,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said, without elaborating on whether that meant a permanent exile.
Prigozhin went silent, which was unusual for a man who used to release multiple written and spoken statements every day.
An elaborate 11-minute statement from Prigozhin appeared the next day, but it contained nothing about where he was or what was next for him and his forces. Instead, he defended himself and the mutiny in his usual defiant manner.
The following morning, on June 27, Russian authorities announced they were dropping the criminal investigation into the revolt, with no charges for the Wagner leader nor any other participants — even though about a dozen Russian troops were killed in clashes and military aircraft were shot down.
On the day the charges were dropped, Prigozhin’s plane was spotted in Belarus, and Belarus’ authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko, who helped broker the deal to end the mutiny, said the Wagner chief had arrived.
On July 6, Lukashenko told reporters that Prigozhin was in St. Petersburg — or “maybe he went to Moscow, or maybe somewhere else, but he is not in Belarus.”
“What will happen to him next? Well, anything can happen in a lifetime. But if you think that Putin is so malicious and vindictive that he will be offed somewhere tomorrow. … No, this will not happen,” Lukashenko assured.
As it turned out, Putin met with Prigozhin on June 29, several days after the revolt.
Comments from the Wagner chief himself became rare. Nothing more was posted by his spokespeople beyond the 11-minute audio message issued two days after the mutiny.
Words or visuals of Prigozhin instead appeared in one of several Telegram channels believed to be linked to Wagner. The relative quiet raised questions over whether keeping a low public profile was part of his deal with the Kremlin.
Prigozhin said in July 19 Telegram video believed to be him that Wagner would train in Belarus and then set off on a new journey to Africa, where his mercenaries have been active in several countries.
Two days later came the plane crash — exactly two months after Priogzhin first announced his revolt.
In the war in Ukraine on Sunday, Russian forces targeted central and northern regions of Ukraine with cruise missiles overnight. Ukraine’s air force reported air defenses intercepted four of them.
In the Kyiv region surrounding the Ukrainian capital, the falling debris damaged a dozen private homes and wounded two people, Ukraine’s Interior Ministry said.
In Kyiv, relatives of soldiers captured by Russian forces in Mariupol gathered for a rally marking 500 days since their family members were in captivity. They demanded that the Ukrainian authorities bring their loved ones home.
In Russia, the Defense Ministry reported bringing down two drones over the Bryansk and Kursk regions that border Ukraine.