DISHING DETAILS

Putin Offered to Let Wagner Keep Fighting on One Condition

The Russian leader divulged new information about talks with the group’s commanders.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said he offered Wagner Group to continue fighting in the war against Ukraine if Yevgeny Prigozhin was booted as the organization’s leader. Speaking to Russia’s Kommersant newspaper, Putin also bizarrely said “Wagner does not exist” because Russia has “no law on private military organizations.” He met with 35 Wagner commanders in the Kremlin on June 29 just days after the group launched an armed rebellion against Russia’s top military officials. “All of them could have gathered in one place and continued to serve,” Kommersant quoted Putin as saying. “And nothing would have changed for them. They would have been led by the same person who had been their real commander all that time,” he added, apparently referring to the senior Wagner figure known as Sedoi. Putin said Wagner commanders nodded at the suggestion of putting Sedoi in charge, but Prigozhin did not see their apparent agreement. “‘No, the boys won’t agree with such a decision,’” Putin quoted Prigozhin as saying.