The Kremlin is losing patience with Wagner boss Prigozhin

Vienna For a good 15 months, Russian troops have been fighting Ukraine in Vladimir Putin’s war of conquest. The regular army provides the majority of the soldiers. But it is supported by dozens of paramilitary groups. Loyal to the President, they receive equipment and orders from the state. However, the estimated several tens of thousands of men are not yet under the command of the army.

Now, “private military companies” like Wagner are actually illegal under Russian law. Officially, they are therefore treated as voluntary associations.

Maintaining the narrative of such independent entities has long been extremely convenient for the Kremlin: the Russian government has been able to claim that it was not Russia that invaded the Donbass in 2014, but “people’s militias” fighting for the rights of the local population.

Since February 2022, Wagner has been doing the particularly dirty work in the Ukraine war. Yevgeny Prigozhin’s militants reduced Bakhmut to rubble, ignoring civilians.