MOSCOW: Russian President Vladimir Putin has said Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin refused to let his fighters serve under someone else’s command, which could have settled the fate of the group.

Three weeks after Prigozhin launched a short-lived rebellion agai­nst Russia’s top military brass, the future and whereabouts of Wagner members remain uncertain.

The Kremlin had confirmed but gave few details about a meeting between Putin, Prigozhin and other Wagner commanders on June 29, five days after the mutiny.

In an interview to Kommersant published on Thursday evening, Putin said he had offered a way forward for Wagner fighters. “[The fighters] could all gather in one place and continue to serve,” Putin told the daily newspaper.

Russia hints at giving legal status to private military groups

They would come under the authority of a commander nicknamed “Sedoy”, according to the newspaper.

“Nothing would have changed for them, they would have been led by the same person who was their real commander all this time,” Putin was cited as saying.

Wagner had operated in the shadows for years. It came into the spotlight during the military operation in Ukraine, despite the fact that private military companies are illegal in Russia.

“The (Wagner) group is here, but it does not exist legally!” said Putin.

Observers say the mutiny was the biggest challenge to Putin’s authority since he came to power at the end of 1999.

On June 23 and 24, thousands of mercenaries took up weapons and marched from southern Russia towards Moscow with the aim of toppling the country’s military leaders.

The mutiny ended with a deal, mediated by Belarus leader Alexander Luka­shenko, under which Pri­gozhin was expected to move to neighbouring Belarus with some of his men.

Private military groups

The Kremlin said on Friday that Russia could grant legal status to private military groups, in what would be a U-turn pro­mpted by the fallout of the Wagner group’s short-lived insurrection last month.

“This issue will be considered,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters, describing a move that would give Russian authorities gre­ater direct control over ostensibly private fighters.

Peskov said that Putin had made the point in an interview published a day earlier with the Kommersant newspaper. Questions around the official status of private mercenary groups “required further consideration”, Peskov paraphrased the Russian leader as saying.

The ambiguity of the relationship between gro­ups like Wagner and the Russian state has given the Kremlin plausible deniability when dispatching private fighters to serve state interests abroad.

But the Wagner group’s failed uprising has seen Moscow bring the group closer under its control, including by removing all heavy military hardware from the organisation’s inventories and striking a deal to exile its leader.

Published in Dawn, July 15th, 2023