Wagner’s Prigozhin Disputes Report That He Offered to Betray Russia

The top of the Wagner non-public army group on Monday rejected a report that he had supplied to share with Ukraine the positioning of Russian Military troops round Bakhmut in change for a withdrawal of Kyiv’s forces from the world in jap Ukraine.

The Wagner group has been a driving pressure behind Russia’s monthslong battle to take Bakhmut, which has price hundreds of lives on each side and lowered a lot of town to rubble. Its founder, Yevgeny V. Prigozhin, has publicly clashed with Russia’s army management over the combat for town, accusing them of ravenous his forces of ammunition.

The Washington Put up reported on Sunday {that a} U.S. intelligence doc leaked on the messaging platform Discord mentioned that Mr. Prigozhin informed contacts in Ukraine’s army intelligence directorate that he was prepared to betray the Russian military’s places round Bakhmut if Kyiv agreed to withdraw from round Bakhmut. A Ukrainian official informed The Put up that Mr. Prigozhin’s provide — made “greater than as soon as” — had been rejected.

In an audio assertion printed on Monday by his press service, Mr. Prigozhin known as the report “hypothesis” and a “hoax.” He prompt that Russia’s corrupt elites, who he mentioned envied his fighters’ achievements on the entrance traces in Ukraine and have been desperate to tank his fame, could possibly be accountable.

Mr. Prigozhin’s mercenaries have taken lead in attempting to seize Bakhmut, the location of the longest and one of many bloodiest battles of the struggle, whereas Russian troops have managed the world across the metropolis’s flanks. Over the previous few weeks, Mr. Prigozhin has stepped up his accusations of incompetence towards the Russian army management.

Regardless of overtly feuding with high Russian officers, Mr. Prigozhin has been cautious to not criticize President Vladimir V. Putin.

Dmitri S. Peskov, the spokesman for Mr. Putin, mentioned that he wouldn’t touch upon The Put up’s report, however mentioned that “it appears to be like like one other hoax.”