President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia held a prolonged assembly with Yevgeny V. Prigozhin simply 5 days after his Wagner personal navy firm launched a quick mutiny, Kremlin spokesman Dmitri S. Peskov mentioned on Monday, noting that “further employment options” for the mercenary group had been among the many issues mentioned.
It is the primary recognized contact between the 2 males since Wagner’s rebellion, which posed probably the most dramatic problem to Mr. Putin’s authority in his greater than 20 years in energy. But the Kremlin’s account of the assembly left a number of unanswered questions concerning the mercenary group’s future.
Mr. Putin invited 35 folks to the three-hour assembly on June 29, together with Mr. Prigozhin and all of Wagner’s prime commanders, the Kremlin spokesman mentioned. He didn’t specify the place the assembly occurred. The particulars of any agreements reached on the assembly stay unclear, and Mr. Prigozhin hasn’t mentioned something about it because the failed mutiny.
“The only thing we can say is that the president gave his assessment of the company’s actions” throughout each the battle in Ukraine and the rebellion, Mr. Peskov mentioned.
The commanders shared with Mr. Putin their model of occasions, he added. “Putin heard out the commanders and proposed further employment options and further combat options,” Mr. Peskov mentioned. The fighters additionally pledged their loyalty to the Russian president.
“They emphasized that they are staunch supporters and soldiers of the head of state and commander in chief — and also said they are prepared to fight for the country going forward,” Mr. Peskov mentioned.
That the Wagner officers had been capable of attend a peaceable assembly with the Russian chief and air their grievances, even after Mr. Putin denounced them as traitors on nationwide tv and vowed to crush their insurrection, demonstrates the ability that Mr. Prigozhin has amassed because the chief of Wagner, whose forces led the marketing campaign to grab Bakhmut in jap Ukraine in certainly one of Russia’s uncommon battlefield victories in current months.
It additionally means that the Kremlin, at the very least in the interim, may see the mercenaries as a risk higher stored throughout the tent than marginalized into an aggrieved and armed opposition.
But Mr. Putin is strolling a deadly line, with any lenience proven to Mr. Prigozhin and his commanders prone to be met with scorn by his personal Defense Ministry, whose management had been the item of Wagner’s ire for months and was the named goal of its short-lived insurrection.
On June 24, the Wagner mercenaries seized the southern Russian metropolis of Rostov-on-Don and an necessary Russian navy headquarters there, earlier than starting a short-lived march on Moscow.
Mr. Prigozhin asserted that the mutiny was aimed not at toppling Mr. Putin or his authorities, however at eradicating the highest leaders of the Russian navy, Defense Minister Sergei Ok. Shoigu and Chief of the General Staff Valery V. Gerasimov.
Nevertheless, Mr. Putin hit again laborious, showing in a nationwide handle to denounce the rebellion as traitorous and warn in opposition to a descent into a brand new Russian civil battle. Mr. Putin promised the harshest punishment for individuals who had “consciously chosen the path of betrayal.”
But the tough punishments didn’t come.
Hours later, the Kremlin introduced a deal, apparently brokered by the autocratic Belarusian chief Aleksandr G. Lukashenko, underneath which Mr. Prigozhin would stand down, keep away from prosecution and depart Russia for Belarus. Wagner fighters who had participated within the mutiny would additionally go free and keep away from punishment; those that didn’t take part can be given the possibility to signal Russian navy contracts.
The settlement prompted outrage amongst some Russian commentators, who had been exasperated that the insurrectionist mercenaries had been dealing with zero punishment, regardless of having shot down Russian plane, leaving an unspecified variety of personnel useless.
The Kremlin has modified its story about Mr. Prigozhin’s whereabouts. On June 29, the day of the assembly between Mr. Putin and Mr. Prigozhin, the Kremlin spokesman instructed reporters that he didn’t know the place the mercenary boss was.
The following week, on July 6, Mr. Peskov mentioned the Kremlin had neither the “ability nor the desire” to trace Mr. Prigozhin’s actions.
The subsequent day, the French newspaper Libération reported that Mr. Putin had met with Mr. Prigozhin and his commanders on the Kremlin to “negotiate the fate of his empire.”
On Monday, Mr. Peskov confirmed that the assembly with Mr. Putin had taken place. The Kremlin spokesman added, “The details of it are unknown.”
Source: www.nytimes.com