Global Courant
MOSCOW (Reuters) – The head of Wagner’s mercenaries, Yevgeny Prigozhin, is set to move to Belarus under a deal brokered by Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko to end to an armed mutiny Prigozhin had led against Russia’s military leadership, the Kremlin said on Saturday.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that Lukashenko had offered to mediate, with the agreement of Russian President Vladimir Putin, because he had personally known Prigozhin for some 20 years.
Peskov said the criminal case opened against Prigozhin for armed mutiny would be dropped and the Wagner fighters who had taken part in his “march for justice” would take no action, in recognition of their previous service to Russia.
Combatants who did not participate would sign contracts with the Defense Department, which aims to bring all autonomous volunteer forces under control by July 1.
Although Putin had previously vowed to punish those who took part in the mutiny, Peskov said the agreement had the “higher purpose” of avoiding confrontation and bloodshed.
Peskov refused to say whether any concessions had been made to Prigozhin, other than guarantees of safety for him – something he said Putin had given his word to vouch for – and for Prigozhin’s men, to persuade him to surrender all his withdraw troops.
He called the day’s events “tragic”.
“There are no more conditions I can tell you about,” Peskov said.
Prigozhin had previously demanded that Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Chief of General Staff Valery Gerasimov be handed over to him.
Asked if there would be personnel changes in the Russian Defense Ministry as a result of the deal, Peskov said:
“These matters are the exclusive prerogative and competence of the Supreme Commander (Putin) in accordance with the Constitution of the Russian Federation. Therefore, these topics are unlikely to be discussed in the course of the above-listed contacts”.
(Reporting by Reuters; Writing by Kevin Liffey; Editing by Andrew Osborn)
