The Kremlin on Thursday dismissed Western suggestions Wagner Group warlord Yevgeny Prigozhin had been murdered on its orders in a plane crash as an “absolute lie” while adding confirmation of his death is dependent on test results.
Russia’s aviation authority has said Prigozhin was aboard the downed private jet as President Vladimir Putin made his first comments, telling journalists at the Kremlin Prigozhin was “a man of complicated destiny,” as Breitbart News reported.
Western politicians and commentators have suggested Putin ordered Prigozhin killed to punish him for launching a failed June 23-34 mutiny against the army’s top brass which also represented the biggest challenge to Putin’s own rule since he came to power in 1999.
Reuters reports Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the accusation and many others like it were false even as other Russian news outlets confirmed his death if not the circumstances around it.
“There is now a great deal of speculation surrounding this plane crash and the tragic deaths of the plane’s passengers, including Yevgeny Prigozhin. Of course, in the West, all this speculation is presented from a well-known angle,” Peskov told reporters.
“All of this is an absolute lie, and here, when covering this issue, it is necessary to base yourself on facts. There are not many facts yet. They need to be established in the course of investigative actions.”
Russian investigators have opened a probe into what happened, but have not yet said what they suspect caused the plane to fall 20,000 feet before exploding on impact soon after taking off from Moscow bound for St. Petersburg.
A portrait of Yevgeny Prigozhin lays at an informal memorial next to the former ‘PMC Wagner Centre’ in St. Petersburg, Russia, Thursday, Aug. 24, 2023. Russia’s civil aviation agency says mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin was aboard a plane that crashed north of Moscow. (AP Photo/Dmitri Lovetsky)
Nor have they officially confirmed the identities of the 10 bodies recovered from the wreckage, the Reuters report sets out.
It remains unclear just why several high-ranking members of Wagner, who are normally exceedingly careful about their security, would have been on the same flight. The purpose of their trip to St. Petersburg was unknown.
Asked if the Kremlin had received official confirmation of Prigozhin’s death, Peskov said: “If you listened carefully to the Russian president’s statement, he said that all the necessary tests, including genetic tests, will now be carried out. The official results – as soon as they are ready to be published, will be published.”
Peskov, who said Putin had not met Prigozhin recently, maintained it was unclear how long the tests and investigative work would take.
It was therefore impossible to start talking about whether Putin would attend Prigozhin’s funeral, Peskov said in answer to a question on the subject.
Asked about the future of the Wagner Group, which has series of lucrative contracts across Africa but now appears leaderless, Peskov was concise in saying he knows nothing.
“I can’t tell you anything now, I don’t know,” he said.