Russia coup: Mercenary boss says armed convoy heading to Moscow to oust Putin | World News

Russian mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin appeared to counsel he had despatched an armed convoy on a 1,200-km (750-mile) value in route of Moscow on Saturday in an unlikely attempt to topple the navy administration.

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Russian native officers acknowledged a navy convoy was on the first motorway linking the southern part of European Russia, bordering Ukraine, with Moscow, and warned residents to avoid it.

Hours earlier, the Russian authorities had accused Prigozhin of staging an armed mutiny after he alleged, with out providing proof, that the navy administration had killed an unlimited number of his fighters in an air strike, and vowed to punish them.

The FSB residence security service acknowledged it had opened a felony case in direction of Prigozhin for armed mutiny, towards the regulation punishable with a jail time interval of as a lot as 20 years.

The dramatic flip of events, with many particulars unclear, appeared like the biggest residence catastrophe President Vladimir Putin has confronted since he ordered a full-scale invasion of Ukraine – one factor he generally known as a “specific navy operation” – in February last yr.

Prigozhin, whose Wagner militia spearheaded the seize of the Ukrainian metropolis of Bakhmut last month, has for months been overtly accusing Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu and Russia’s prime primary, Valery Gerasimov, of rank incompetence and of denying Wagner ammunition and help in its battles in Ukraine.

As their feud appeared to return to a head, the ministry issued a press launch saying Prigozhin’s accusations had been “not true and are an informational provocation”.

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Prigozhin acknowledged his actions weren’t a navy coup. Nevertheless in a frenzied assortment of audio messages, throughout which the sound of his voice typically various and couldn’t be independently verified, he appeared to counsel that 25,000 fighters had been en path to oust the leaders of the defence establishment in Moscow.

Early on Friday, he had appeared to cross a model new line in his increasingly more vitriolic feud with the ministry, saying that Putin’s stated rationale for invading Ukraine was based mostly totally on lies concocted by the navy’s prime brass.

About 2 a.m. (2300 GMT), Prigozhin posted a message on the Telegram app saying his forces had crossed into Russia from Ukraine and had been in Rostov.

He acknowledged they'd been in a position to “go all one of the simplest ways” in direction of the best brass and destroy anyone who stood of their strategy.

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Throughout the similar time, the state data firm TASS quoted Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov as saying all Russia’s major security firms had been reporting to Putin “across the clock” on the fulfilment of his orders with respect to Prigozhin.

Security was being tightened in Moscow, Mayor Sergei Sobyanin acknowledged on his Telegram channel.

In Washington, U.S. President Joe Biden has been briefed on the Russia state of affairs, a White Residence spokesperson acknowledged.

About 5 a.m. (0200 GMT), the administration of the Voronezh space, on the M-4 motorway between the regional capital Rostov-on-Don and Moscow, acknowledged on Telegram that a navy convoy was on the freeway and urged residents to avoid using it.

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Unverified footage posted on social media confirmed a convoy of varied navy autos, along with on the very least one tank and one armoured automotive on flatbed autos. It was not clear the place they'd been, or whether or not or not the coated autos throughout the convoy contained fighters. Among the many autos had been flying the Russian flag.

Footage on channels based in Rostov-on-Don confirmed armed males in navy uniform skirting the regional police headquarters throughout the metropolis on foot, along with tanks positioned open air the headquarters of the Southern Military District. Reuters confirmed the locations confirmed nonetheless couldn’t determine when the footage was shot.

In his audio messages, Prigozhin acknowledged: “People who destroyed our lads, who destroyed the lives of many tens of lots of of Russian troopers, shall be punished. I ask that no one provide resistance…

“There are 25,000 of us and we’re going to find out why chaos is happening throughout the nation,” he acknowledged, promising to destroy any checkpoints or air forces that purchased in Wagner’s strategy.

FSB URGES WAGNER FIGHTERS TO DETAIN PRIGOZHIN

The FSB acknowledged Prigozhin’s statements had been “requires the start of an armed civil battle on Russian territory and his actions are a ‘stab throughout the once more’ of Russian servicemen stopping pro-fascist Ukrainian forces”.

It added: “We urge the … fighters to not make irreparable errors, to stop any forcible actions in direction of the Russian people, to not carry out the felony and traitorous orders of Prigozhin, to take measures to detain him.”

Army Lieutenant-Widespread Vladimir Alekseyev issued a video attraction asking Prigozhin to rethink his actions.

“Solely the president has one of the best to appoint the best administration of the armed forces, and you are trying to encroach on his authority,” he acknowledged.

Army Widespread Sergei Surovikin, the deputy commander of Russian forces in Ukraine, whom Prigozhin has praised beforehand, acknowledged in a video that “the enemy is just prepared for our interior political state of affairs to deteriorate”.

“Sooner than it’s too late … it's best to bear the necessity and order of the people’s president of the Russian Federation. Stop the columns and return them to their eternal bases,” he acknowledged.

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An unverified video on a Telegram channel close to Wagner confirmed the purported scene of an air strike in direction of Wagner forces. It confirmed a forest the place small fires had been burning and bushes appeared to have been broken by energy. There appeared to be one physique, nonetheless no additional direct proof of any assault.

It carried the caption: “A missile assault was launched on the camps of PMC (Personal Military Agency) Wagner. Many victims. Consistent with eyewitnesses, the strike was delivered from the rear, that’s, it was delivered by the navy of the Russian Ministry of Defence.”

Prigozhin has tried to benefit from Wagner’s battlefield success, achieved at monumental human worth, to publicly berate Moscow with seeming impunity, whereas rigorously avoiding criticism of Putin.

Nevertheless for the first time on Friday, he dismissed Putin’s core justifications for invading Ukraine 16 months previously, one factor for which many Russians have been fined or jailed.

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“The battle was wished … so that Shoigu may change right into a marshal … so that he may get a second ‘Hero’ [of Russia] medal,” Prigozhin acknowledged in a video clip.

“The battle wasn’t wished to demilitarise or denazify Ukraine,” he acknowledged, referring to Putin’s justifications for the battle.