Putin discusses Ukraine war with top Wagner commander Troshev
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Mr Andrei Troshev is from St Petersburg, Mr Putin’s home town, and has been pictured with the president.
PHOTO: REUTERS
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MOSCOW - Russian President Vladimir Putin was on Friday shown meeting one of the most senior former commanders of the Wagner mercenary group and discussing how best to use “volunteer units” in the Ukraine war.
The meeting underscored the Kremlin’s attempt to show that the state had now gained control over the mercenary group after a failed mutiny in June killed with other senior commanders
Just days after the Wagner mutiny, Mr Putin offered the mercenaries the opportunity to keep fighting but suggested that commander Andrei Troshev take over from Mr Prigozhin, Russia’s Kommersant newspaper has reported.
The Kremlin said that Mr Putin had met Mr Troshev, who is known by his nom de guerre “Sedoi” – or “grey hair” – and Deputy Defence Minister Yunus-Bek Yevkurov, who sat closest to Mr Putin, on Thursday night.
Addressing Mr Troshev, Mr Putin said that they had spoken about “volunteer units that can perform various combat tasks, above all, of course, in the zone of the special military operation”.
“You yourself have been fighting in such a unit for more than a year,” Mr Putin said. “You know what it is, how it is done, you know about the issues that need to be resolved in advance so that the combat work goes in the best and most successful way.”
Mr Putin also said that he wanted to speak about social support for those involved in the fighting. The meeting took place in the Kremlin and was shown on state television.
Mr Troshev was shown listening to Mr Putin, leaning forward and nodding, pencil in hand. His remarks were not shown.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told the RIA news agency that Mr Troshev now worked at the defence ministry.
The fate of Wagner, one of the world’s most battle-hardened mercenary forces, has been unclear since Mr Prigozhin’s failed June 23 mutiny and his death on Aug 23.
The aborted mutiny is widely regarded to have posed the most serious internal challenge to Mr Putin – and to the Russian state – for decades. Mr Prigozhin had said the mutiny was not aimed at toppling Mr Putin, but at settling scores with Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu and Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov.
After his death, Mr Putin ordered Wagner fighters to sign an oath of allegiance
The Putin meeting appears to indicate that what remains of Wagner will now be overseen by Mr Troshev and Mr Yevkurov, who has travelled over recent months to several countries where the mercenaries work.
A decorated veteran of Russia’s wars in Afghanistan and Chechnya and a former commander in the SOBR interior ministry rapid reaction force, Mr Troshev is from St Petersburg, Mr Putin’s home town, and has been pictured with the President.
He was awarded Russia’s highest medal, Hero of Russia, in 2016 for the storming of Palmyra in Syria against Islamic State in Iraq and Syria militants. REUTERS
