Yevgeny Prigozhin, owner of the private military company Wagner Group, entered the Russian city of Rostov-on-Don along with his mercenaries on Saturday, calling for an armed rebellion to overthrow Russia’s defense minister.
Prigozhin accused Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu of ordering a missile attack on a Wagner war camp in Ukraine, killing 2,000 of his soldiers in multiple video and audio recordings posted online Friday.
In response, Prigozhin said that his forces would punish Shoigu and urged Russian forces not to withstand, threatening to “destroy” anyone who tried to stop them.
“Those that destroyed our boys, who destroyed the lives of many tens of 1000’s of Russian soldiers, shall be punished. I ask that nobody resist…” he said in a recording of one of his famous tirades.
“We’re 25,000 and we’re going to seek out out why the country is in chaos,” he said, promising to take care of any checkpoints or air force that got in Wagner’s way.
![Head and owner of Wagner Group Yevgeny Prigozhin, a Russian private military contractor.](https://nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/06/NYPICHPDPICT000012264701-1.jpg?w=1024)
“We’ll consider anyone who tries to withstand the threat and we are going to destroy them quickly,” he said.
The defense ministry denied the missile attack, and Russian generals accused Prigozhin of orchestrating the coup.
Prigozhin said that Wagner encountered no resistance once they crossed into Russia from Ukraine.
From “Putin’s cook” to a paramilitary leader
The 62-year-old millionaire has a long-running feud with the Defense Ministry, whose leaders he has openly criticized for months in vulgar tirades as incompetent and accused of withholding arms and ammunition for his troops who’re fighting on behalf of Russia in Ukraine.
Prigozhin began his profession as a petty criminal – in 1981 he was convicted of robbery and assault and served 12 years in prison. After being released in the Nineteen Nineties, he opened a restaurant in St. Petersburg, where he became friends with the then vice-president of the city and future president of Russia, Vladimir Putin.
He used his relationship with Putin to secure lucrative government catering contracts and serve meals in the Kremlin, earning him the nickname “Putin’s cook”.
He later expanded into the media and was accused in the United States of interfering in the 2016 presidential election through his infamous online “troll factory.”
Prigozhin confirmed in January that he is the founder, leader and financier of Wagner.
What is the Wagner Group?
Wagner saw his first motion in the separatist conflict in Ukraine’s Donbas region in 2014 after Russia annexed Crimea. Russia was capable of refuse to send any military personnel or supplies, hiring privately contracted fighters to do their dirty work.
Wagner quickly gained a fame for his brutality around the world.
Its forces have fought in Syria alongside the Russian-backed government of President Bashar Assad in the civil war, in addition to in other conflicts in Africa.
Prigozhin is reported to have used his deployment to secure mining contracts, that are then used to finance the war in Ukraine, US Undersecretary of State Victoria Nuland said in January.
Wagner has been accused of human rights violations across Africa, including the Central African Republic, Libya and Mali, by Western countries and UN experts.
![Yevgeny Prigozhin asks Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to withdraw the remaining Ukrainian forces from Bakhmut to save their lives at an unspecified location in Ukraine.](https://nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/06/NYPICHPDPICT000013091358.jpg?w=1024)
![Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, right, escorted by a group of officers, greets a military doctor as he inspects Russian soldiers at an undisclosed location in Ukraine](https://nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/06/NYPICHPDPICT000013091363-1.jpg?w=1024)
The role of the Wagner Group in Russia’s war in Ukraine
The corporate played a major role in the Ukrainian War after the Russians suffered heavy casualties and setbacks against Ukrainian forces supported by Western allies.
Prigozhin toured Russian prisons to recruit Wagner fighters – offering to pardon their crimes in the event that they served a half-month tour on the Ukrainian front.
In May, he boasted in an interview that he had recruited 50,000 fighters, of whom about 10,000 died during the grueling and bloody capture of the city of Bakhmut. The town was Russia’s only major advance since the start of the war.
![Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of the Wagner Group's military company, speaks holding the Russian national flag in front of his troops in Bakhmut, Ukraine.](https://nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/06/NYPICHPDPICT000013091359-1.jpg?w=1024)
Nearly half of the 20,000 Russian soldiers killed in Ukraine since December have been Wagner’s soldiers in Bakhmut.
The Americans estimate that Wagner had about 50,000 combat personnel in Ukraine, including 10,000 contractors and 40,000 convicts.
In keeping with US officials, the Wagner Group spends about $100 million a month fighting in Ukraine.
In December, Washington accused North Korea of supplying a Russian company with weapons in violation of a UN Security Council resolution.
Each Wagner and North Korea denied the reports.
With Russia’s 2024 presidential election looming, many speculated that Prigozhin could be Putin’s successor if the longtime leader selected to not run for re-election.
With postal wires