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Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu inspected Russian troops in footage broadcast on state TV this morning – his first public appearance since a failed mutiny by Wagner forces plunged the country into chaos.
Wagner Group chief Yevgeny Prigozhin on Friday declared a ‘march of justice’ to oust the defence minister, during which the mercenaries captured the southern city of Rostov-on-Don and then marched on Moscow.Â
Shoigu’s emergence appeared to be a message from president Vladimir Putin to the mercenary group’s chief, signalling the embattled Russian despot would not axe his defence minister from his post despite the risk to his regime.
It came after Wagner mercenaries pulled back from the brink on Sunday and headed back to their base when Putin agreed to allow Prigozhin to avoid treason charges and accept exile in neighbouring Belarus in exchange for a deescalation.Â
But while he was hailed as a hero by some, members of Russia’s convict army issued a threat against the Wagner warlord – accusing him of a betrayal after he abandoned his coup against the Kremlin.
Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu (centre) inspected Russian troops in footage broadcast in the country this morning – his first public appearance since a failed mutiny by Wagner forces plunged the country into chaos
Yet Shoigu, 68, who was out of sight on Sunday, was seen in footage released by his ministry early today (pictured) dressed in military fatigues meeting Russia’s Western group of troops and receiving a report from Colonel-General Yevgeny Nikiforov
Shoigu’s emergence appeared to be a message from Russian president Vladimir Putin (pictured on Saturday) to the mercenary group’s chief Yevgeny Prigozhin, signalling the embattled despot would not axe his defence minister from his post
Members of Russia’s convict army (pictured) issued a threat against the Wagner warlord – accusing him of a betrayal after he abandoned his coup against the Kremlin
In a video posted online, a group of prisoners-turned fighters said Prigozhin’s decision to pull back before reaching Moscow was ‘cowardice’.
They said his supporters now faced retaliation from Russia’s military, and that he had ‘double-crossed them’ by striking an amnesty deal with the Kremlin.
According to The Telegraph, the video came from one of the Russian army’s Storm-Z brigades which are made up of convicts offered pardons in exchange for fighting.
While Wagner has also recruited convicts from prisons under the same terms, Storm-Z units are separate from the mercenary group. Despite this distinction, many fighters in the units consider Prigozhin as an unofficial commander-in-chief.
Prigozhin, who once served jail time himself, toured Russian prisons recruiting fighters – promising them freedom in exchange for six months of service.
In the video, one of the Storm-Z fighters claimed the Wagner boss had ‘leaked’ at the last minute – Russian jail slang to suggest he lost his nerve, The Telegraph reports.
‘You promised everything to our guys, and our Storm unit and others were ready to fight firmly for you,’ the fighter says, speaking directly to camera. ‘Then you turned the steering wheel in the other direction.’Â
Prigozhin’s agreement brought an end to an extraordinary crisis after his private army tried to storm Moscow – posing the biggest challenge to Putin in more than 20 years of his rule that risked bringing down the Kremlin regime.
Shoigu is the first of three powerful Russian leaders whose diverging interests led to the Wagner Group occupying Rostov-on-Don to be seen since the revolt ended.
He is facing down a demand from coup-plotting Prigozhin that his head should roll – along with chief of the army Gen Valery Gerasimov – over Russia’s faltering, 16-month long invasion of Ukraine that has seen hundreds of thousands of casualties.
Prigozhin has repeatedly blamed Shoigu and Gerasimov, chief of the general staff, for his fighters’ deaths and has made clear his disdain for the fact that he has visited the frontlines in Ukraine while the pair have remained in Russia.
Putin and Prigozhin have made no public statements since Wagner retreated.
Yet Shoigu, 68, who was out of sight on Sunday, was seen in footage released by his ministry early today dressed in military fatigues meeting Russia’s Western group of troops and receiving a report from Colonel-General Yevgeny Nikiforov.
A defiant Shoigu – fighting for his job – ‘listened to a report from the commander of the Western group, Col-Gen Nikiforov, on the current situation at the front’ and the ‘nature of enemy actions’ according to reports.
The footage shows the defence minister studying maps and taking a helicopter ride to inspect Russian positions.Â
The footage shows Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu (right) listening to a report being presented on the area’s military situation, studying maps and taking a helicopter ride (pictured) to inspect Russian positions
Shoigu (centre) was facing down a demand from coup-plotting Prigozhin that his head should roll along with chief of the army Gen Valery Gerasimov
It was initially not possible to ascertain when the visit took place.
One picture shows the time on Shoigu’s watch as being shortly before one o’clock.
However it remains unclear if his visit to the war command post was earlier today or yesterday – or if older footage was suddenly released to show him in charge.
Rumours are swirling in Moscow that Putin, 70, has lined up Tula governor and ex-deputy defence minister Alexei Dyumin, 50, to be the next defence minister, replacing Shoigu.
He is a trusted former Putin bodyguard who once saved the Kremlin leader from attack by a vicious brown bear.
He is rumoured to have played a role in the pact which stopped the coup march into Moscow on Saturday. And he is believed to be involved in secret funding channels used by the Kremlin elite.
Putin has not fired any of his top team – many now in their late sixties or early seventies – during the war.
Gerasmov, 67, also remains in post so far despite Prigozhin’s demands for him to be fired and even prosecuted.
Meanwhile on Monday morning, Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said he was cancelling a counter-terrorism regime imposed in the Russian capital during the Wagner mutiny.
Sobyanin made the announcement in a statement posted on the Telegram messaging application on Monday.Â
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Russian media cited local Federal Security Service (FSB) offices as saying similar regimes had been cancelled in the Voronezh and Moscow regions.
Separately, Russia’s National Anti-terrorism Committee said the situation in the country was ‘stable’.
The anti-terrorist regimes were imposed in the three regions on Saturday, as a column of the rebellious Wagner mercenaries moved towards Moscow, exchanging fire with security forces and bringing down Russian military aircraft.
Prigozhin was last seen late Saturday in an SUV leaving Rostov-on-Don, where his fighters had seized a military headquarters, to the cheers of some local people.
Yevgeny Prigozhin (right) the owner of the Wagner Group military company, sits inside a military vehicle posing for a selfie with a local civilian after retreating to the group’s base in Rostov-on-Don, Russia, on Saturday
Members of Wagner group prepare to pull out from the headquarters of the Southern Military District to return to their base in Rostov-on-Don late on Saturday
This was after agreeing a deal to turn back his coup forces marching on Moscow.
Some shook his hand through the car window. Trucks carrying armoured vehicles with fighters on them followed his car.
Within hours of Prigozhin’s announcement that his forces would return to base to avoid ‘spilling Russian blood’, the Kremlin said he would leave for Belarus.
In exchange, Russia will drop the ‘armed rebellion’ charges against Prigozhin and not prosecute Wagner troops, it added.
The Belarus deal removes Prigozhin’s control of Wagner, but it’s unclear whether any of his fighters would follow him to Belarus, either out of a sense of loyalty or due to dismay with being absorbed into the Russian military as contract soldiers.
‘These personnel could potentially sign contracts with the MoD on an individual basis, demobilize in Russia – (or) travel to Belarus in some capacity,’ the Institute for the Study of War think tank said in its report on the failed rebellion.
If in Belarus, there would be concerns about whether they could get access to the Russian battlefield nuclear weapons. Dmitry Medvedev, the deputy head of Russia’s security council, was worried about them gaining control of Russian weapons as the uprising roiled on Saturday.
‘The world will be put on the brink of destruction’ if Wagnerites obtain nuclear weapons, Medvedev warned.
In their lightning advance, Prigozhin’s forces on Saturday took control of two military hubs in southern Russia and got within 120 miles of Moscow before retreating.
The mutiny was the culmination of Prigozhin’s long-standing feud with the Russian military’s top brass over the conduct of the Russian operation in Ukraine.
People in Rostov-on-Don cheered Wagner troops as they departed late Saturday, a scene that played into Putin’s fear of a popular uprising. Some ran to shake hands with Prigozhin as he drove away in an SUV.
Yet the rebellion fizzled quickly, in part because Prigozhin did not have the backing he apparently expected from Russian security services. The Federal Security Services immediately called for his arrest.
Putin had on Saturday denounced the revolt as treason, vowing to punish the perpetrators. He accused them of pushing Russia to the brink of civil war.
Later the same day, however, he had accepted an agreement brokered by Belarus to avert Moscow’s most serious security crisis in decades.
Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko said he had negotiated the truce with Prigozhin. Moscow thanked him, but observers noted that an intervention by Lukashenko, usually seen as Putin’s junior partner, was itself an embarrassment.
Ukraine revelled in the chaos, stepping up its own counter-offensive against Russian forces, while analysts also said the deal had exposed weakness in the Russian president’s grip on power.Â
Zelensky’s senior aide Mykhailo Podolyak tweeted that ‘Prigozhin humiliated Putin/the state and showed that there is no longer a monopoly on violence’.
Russia insisted the rebellion had no impact on its faltering Ukraine campaign, and said Sunday that it had repelled new offensive attacks by Ukrainian forces.
Ukrainian soldiers leaving the front line Sunday said the revolt had not noticeably affected fighting around Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine.
‘Most people, most military, understand very well that the circus from Russia is still here,’ said Nazar, a 26-year-old bearded soldier, parked at a service station on a road leading out of the Bakhmut area.
Kyiv, however, said the unrest offered a ‘window of opportunity’ for its long-awaited counter-offensive.
Wagner’s fighters, made up of volunteers and ex-security officers but also thousands of convicts, were often thrown into the front of Russia’s advance in Ukraine.
The outfit also conducts several operations in the Middle East and Africa, largely seen as having Moscow’s blessing.
A man sits atop an armored vehicle in southern Russia as residents in the street talk with military personnel on Saturday, while awaiting news of Wagner’s march on the capital
Residents of the southern Russian city of Rostov take photos of an armoured vehicle in the street as they talk with military personnel on Saturday, June 24
The US had intelligence that Prigozhin had been building up his forces near the border with Russia for some time.Â
That conflicts with Prigozhin’s claim that his rebellion was a response to an attack on his field camps in Ukraine on Friday by the Russian military that he said killed a large number of his men.
The Defense Ministry denied attacking the camps.
US Rep. Mike Turner, who chairs the House Intelligence Committee, said Prigozhin’s march on Moscow appeared to have been planned in advance.
