Wagner mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin has been seen addressing his soldiers in Belarus in a recently released video, marking the Russian warlord’s first public appearance since his revolt last month.
In the video, Prigozhin expresses his displeasure with the Russian military’s conduct in the Ukrainian conflict, calling it a “disgrace.”
He goes on to say that Wagner forces will not be fighting in Ukraine for the time being.
Prigozhin addressed a gathering of several thousand combatants, according to the Wagner Orchestra Telegram group, though the precise number was unclear owing to the low-light film.
Prigozhin also claims that his fighters will stay in Belarus for a while because they were received cordially by the Belarusians, whom he refers to as “brothers”.
In the video, Prigozhin said: “What is going on the front line today is a shame in which we shouldn’t take part,
“We may return to the special military operation when we feel sure that we will not be forced to put shame on ourselves,
“We need to wait for the moment when we can show ourselves in full.
“That is why a decision has been made that we would spend some time here in Belarus. During that time, we will make the Belarusian army the second strongest army in the world. We will train, raise our level and set off for a new journey to Africa.”
Wagner mercenaries have been sent to Syria and many African countries in addition to Ukraine since the private army’s inception in 2014.
Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of the Wagner group, promised to end his revolt in exchange for amnesty for himself and his men, as well as freedom to transfer to Belarus, thanks to a deal arranged by Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko.
Wagner handed over its weaponry to the Russian military before going to Belarus as part of Russian authorities’ efforts to neutralise the threat presented by mercenaries.
Prigozhin had only produced a couple of audio messages during the mutiny, in stark contrast to the previous frequent and strong statements he made prior to the events of June 23-24.
On Monday, a messaging app channel linked to the PMC ran a video showing Russian and Wagner flags lowered at the mercenaries’ main home base in Molkino in the Krasnodar region of southern Russia.
The channel said that the base would close on July 30, and one of the mercenaries in the video declared that Wagner was moving to unspecified new locations.
Wagner also has used camps in the Russia-occupied Luhansk region of Ukraine.
Prigozhin presented the flag to cheering mercenaries in the video posted Wednesday.
