Yevgeny Prigozhin, Renegade Mercenary Chief Who Rattled Kremlin

Yevgeny V. Prigozhin, the outspoken tycoon who constructed a non-public paramilitary pressure that fought on Russia’s behalf in Ukraine and Africa however whose harsh judgment of its military management led him to instigate a insurrection, was extensively believed to be lifeless on Thursday, a day after a aircraft through which he was stated to be touring crashed in Russia. He was 62.

Although his dying has not been formally declared by the Russian authorities or confirmed by members of the family or enterprise associates, President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia spoke of Mr. Prigozhin prior to now tense on Thursday and supplied condolences to the households of the crash’s 10 victims. And Pentagon officers for the primary time brazenly stated they consider that Mr. Prigozhin didn’t survive the crash, through which all on board have been killed. His identify was on the passenger record.

Mr. Prigozhin had lengthy leveraged an in depth relationship with the Kremlin to realize profitable authorities building and catering contracts, and he constructed up the paramilitary pressure, referred to as Wagner, in shut cooperation with Russia’s army intelligence providers.

For years he saved a low public profile. Even as Wagner performed operations on Moscow’s behalf in Syria and in a number of African international locations, he denied any affiliation.

Mr. Prigozhin started to embrace a public profile solely after Mr. Putin launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, acknowledging later that yr that he had based and run Wagner. Signing contract troopers and recruiting jail inmates, he constructed Wagner right into a pressure estimated at 50,000.

In remarks a day after the aircraft crash, Mr. Putin stated he had recognized Mr. Prigozhin for the reason that early Nineteen Nineties — a revelation, for the reason that timing of their relationship had lengthy been a thriller. Mr. Prigozhin as soon as stated in an interview that he first met Mr. Putin in 2000.

Speaking in a gathering broadcast on tv, Mr. Putin continued: “This was a person with a complicated fate. He made some serious mistakes in life, but he also achieved necessary results.”

He stated that Russian investigators would pursue the investigation into the crash “to the end,” and supplied his condolences to the households of those that perished within the crash.

Mr. Prigozhin had emerged as a public energy participant prior to now a number of months, utilizing social media, specifically the Telegram messaging platform, to create a private model out of powerful speak, obscenity-laced movies and a willingness to endorse extrajudicial killing.

Mr. Prigozhin additionally grew to become a harsh critic of the best way Russia’s army management performed the struggle in Ukraine, issuing denunciations that Mr. Putin left unchecked at the same time as the federal government cracked down on different critics. Close sufficient to the president that he was referred to as “Putin’s chef,” Mr. Prigozhin had been cautious to not tackle Mr. Putin instantly. And for his half, Mr. Putin appeared excited about making a kind of competitors amongst his army leaders.

But Mr. Prigozhin escalated his feud with the army management exponentially on June 23, saying in a 30-minute video that the invasion of Ukraine was a “racket” perpetrated by a corrupt elite chasing cash and glory with out concern for Russian lives. Within hours, he had accused the Russian Army of attacking his forces, pledged to retaliate, and deployed his forces on Russian floor itself, quickly claiming management of the southern metropolis of Rostov-on-Don, the house of the Russian southern command about 60 miles from the border with Ukraine.

Then, as his troops superior towards Moscow, Mr. Prigozhin abruptly known as off the short-lived mutiny, which had challenged Russia’s veneer of political stability. He agreed to withdraw from Rostov-on-Don underneath a deal that will drop fees towards him and permit him and any fighters loyal to him to depart for Belarus. Since then, he has printed movies that seem to position him in places in Belarus, Russia and Africa, however none could possibly be independently verified.

Mr. Prigozhin (pronounced pree-GOH-zhin) was born in 1961 in the identical hometown as Mr. Putin: St. Petersburg, then referred to as Leningrad. He spent 9 years in jail within the Nineteen Eighties on theft and different fees. Shortly after he was freed in 1990, simply as personal enterprise was exploding throughout Russia, Mr. Prigozhin and his mom, Violetta, arrange a community of hot-dog stands. His enterprise pursuits got here to incorporate a grocery store chain, casinos, building and, ultimately, work associated to the army.

His firm Concord Catering started profitable profitable contracts to provide meals to colleges, authorities staff after which the military. According to Russian news media reviews, corporations affiliated with Mr. Prigozhin persuaded Russia’s Parliament to alter bidding legal guidelines, a uncommon step, so they might qualify for army building contracts value thousands and thousands.

Wagner’s roots hint to 2014, when Russia launched its first invasion of jap Ukraine, a clandestine operation. Mr. Prigozhin sought land from the Defense Ministry to coach a non-public military that might combat on behalf of Russia with out an official hyperlink to the federal government. He was given the land, within the western Krasnodar area.

It was a handy mixture, stated Andrei Soldatov, an knowledgeable on Russia’s safety providers, as a result of it allowed Moscow to deploy skilled, Russian-led army operations overseas whereas sustaining believable deniability.

Soldiers skilled by Wagner would go on to interact in wars within the Middle East and throughout Africa, along with Ukraine. Human rights teams have accused Wagner troopers of committing atrocities in Syria, Libya, the Central African Republic, Sudan and Mozambique.

Mr. Prigozhin additionally oversaw an entity referred to as the Internet Research Agency, based mostly in his native metropolis, which sought to affect the 2016 U.S. presidential election by spreading false news and disseminating messages supporting Donald J. Trump.

In 2016, the United States imposed monetary sanctions on Mr. Prigozhin and several other of his companies in relation to these actions. Two years later, he was considered one of 13 Russian residents indicted by a U.S. federal grand jury on fees of meddling within the election. He denied his involvement with the company for years, simply as he had denied his affiliation with Wagner, however after the February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, he went public about his actions.

“I’ve never just been the financier of the Internet Research Agency,” he wrote in a assertion to a consortium of Western journalists in February. “I invented it, I created it, I managed it for a long time. It was created to protect the Russian information space from boorish aggressive propaganda of anti-Russian theses from the West.”

Similarly, he acknowledged founding and operating Wagner solely in September 2022. Mr. Prigozhin’s paramilitary pressure took on an more and more public function after the Russian Army’s plan to seize Kyiv instantly within the preliminary days of the struggle had failed. He was seen in movies personally recruiting inmates from jail to serve in Wagner.

“If you serve six months, you are free,” Mr. Prigozhin instructed a bunch of uniformed inmates in a single video printed in September. But he was additionally blunt about their destiny ought to they show disloyal. “If you arrive in Ukraine and decide it’s not for you, we will execute you,” he stated.

He was in a position to recruit many 1000’s of prisoners earlier than saying in February that he would cease the observe.

As his troopers have been thrown into brutal battles for management of cities in jap Ukraine, together with Bakhmut, Mr. Prigozhin repeatedly recorded movies close to the entrance traces, searching for credit score for battlefield victories, praising his troops as “probably the most experienced army in the world today,” and lambasting the Russian army management. In home polls, he grew to become one of many best-recognized political figures in Russia.

On his social media channels, and on a media outlet he managed, RIA FAN, he repeatedly printed movies that struck populist themes and drew implicit contrasts with the Russian protection minister, Sergei Okay. Shoigu, who had by no means served as a soldier. Mr. Prigozhin steadily traveled to Wagner encampments, and his criticism of the army management and Moscow’s “elite” grew to become blistering because the struggle continued.

He additionally embraced ruthless violence towards perceived enemies. When a video surfaced of a person who had defected after agreeing to combat for Wagner being killed with a sledgehammer, Mr. Prigozhin appeared to endorse the motion.

“A dog’s death for a dog,” he wrote.-

Recently, he known as for the imposition of martial regulation and the cessation of regular authorities actions in Russia, claiming such steps have been wanted to win the struggle.

“We must stop building new roads and infrastructure facilities and work only for the war, to live for a few years in the image of North Korea,” he stated in an interview printed on the Telegram messaging platform in May. “If we win, we can build anything.”

Mr. Prigozhin was typically seen as a creation of Mr. Putin, who analysts say watched and even enabled his public feud with Mr. Shoigu to spur competitors for outcomes. But many questioned how lengthy it may proceed earlier than escalating into one thing violent.

In the Telegram interview, Mr. Prigozhin forecast political violence brought on by family of lifeless and wounded troopers more and more disillusioned by what he described as a coddled elite.

“Society always demands justice,” he stated, “and if there is no justice, then revolutionary sentiments arise.”

Oleg Matsnev contributed reporting from Berlin, and Anton Troianovski from London.