A 2017 video posted online showed a group of armed people, reported to be Wagner contractors, torturing a Syrian man, beating him to death with a sledgehammer and cutting his head before mutilating and then burning his body. The Russian high command in Syria assured us it was not their people, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis told senators in testimony last month. Known colloquially as the Wagner Group, the contingent has been linked to a network of Russian firms that U.S. and European authorities say are financed by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a key player in Putins inner circle known as Putins chef. Although the Wagner Group has been implicated in several violations of international law, including skirting a UN arms embargo in Libya, the Moscow legal filing on Boutas case marks the first time that any official complaint has been brought in court against the private security contingent in connection with an alleged war crime. Investigative paper wants atrocities of alleged Russian mercenaries in Syria probed after graphic VIDEO We now bring you another report, this time from Syria, where the horrific torture and murder of a Syrian man in 2017 allegedly at the hands of Russian Prigozhin is also believed to have created and funded the Internet Research Agency, an online "troll farm" that U.S. authorities have charged with waging a propaganda-and-influence campaign in a bid to sway the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Join FPs Ravi Agrawal for a frank discussion about the Biden administrations China policy and alternatives that it ought to consider. Join FPs Ravi Agrawal for a frank discussion about the Biden administrations China policy and alternatives that it ought to consider. But later they appear to let their guard down, as one says: Hide your faces well, whatever, this video wont go up anywhere anyway.. And how might that be impacting the world? Is the Biden administrations China policy too hawkish? Their structure allows them to have plausible deniability and to create distance between the Russian state and the group, she said. Commanders briefed pilots and ground crews. If Putin had hoped to weaken NATO, the very opposite has happened, with Finland and Sweden on the cusp of joining the transatlantic military alliance. Lost in the desert, he appears to have sought refuge in al-Shaer gas field, where he was later tortured and killed. The newspaper identifies the man by his first name and the first letter of his surname but withholds his full name amid concerns for his family's safety. Yevgeny Prigozhin, a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin who was indicted in the United States for attempted interference in the 2016 presidential election, is widely regarded as the driving force behind the mercenary group. A few days later, Novaya Gazeta, one of Russias only remaining independent daily news outlets, published a report naming Stanislav Dychko as one of several Russian nationals depicted in the video. 'There's no one to help': Russian mercenary industry's toll on families, Original reporting and incisive analysis, direct from the Guardian every morning. The reports revelations have chilling implications, as Russian mercenaries motivated by both money and far-right ideology are increasingly operating unchecked in some of the worlds most fragile countries. Essential analysis of the stories shaping geopolitics on the continent. Russia Forced Me to Flee. Click + to receive email alerts when new stories are published on Gruesome Soundtrack After working for a time in Lebanon, Bouta decided to return to his family in Deir Ezzor. Syrias government controls oil, gas, and mineral production and export, and Syrias General Petroleum Company sets strategy for exploration and development and supervises national subsidiaries, including the Syrian Petroleum Company (SPC) and Syrian Gas Company (SGC). "I'm at risk. It included some Syrian government soldiers and militias, but American military and intelligence officials have said a majority were private Russian paramilitary mercenaries and most likely a part of the Wagner Group, a company often used by the Kremlin to carry out objectives that officials do not want to be connected to the Russian government. Bouta is believed to have been killed in the spring of 2017, and a video of his death first emerged online in June 2017. In a legal criminal complaint announced Monday on behalf of the victim, Muhammad Hamdi Bouta Taha al-Abdullah, attorneys representing the victims brother allege that six Russian citizens who worked on a contract to secure a Russian-Syrian operated gas plant were behind the 2017 killing. The group reportedly took its name from the nom de guerre of its leader, Dmitry Utkin, a retired Russian military officer. He married and started a family. NPR's Charles Maynes offers a portrait from Prigozhin's home town Saint Petersburg. Were going to Moscow, to their territory, to their courts, and to their jurisdiction, Darwish said. The lawsuit marks the first known attempt to bring to account anyone linked to the highly secretive network of covert operators financed and managed by close inner-circle associates of President Vladimir Putin. Bouta was born in August 1986 in the Syrian province of Deir Ezzor in a village not far from where one of his alleged assailants, Vlaidslav Apostol, was killed only months after beating Bouta with a sledgehammer. One-stop digest of politics, economics, and culture. The documents described the fighters as a pro-regime force, loyal to President Bashar al-Assad of Syria. Russias Wagner Group have as much power in Kremlin as ministers, Original reporting and incisive analysis, direct from the Guardian every morning. The shaky cell phone footage taken at al-Shaer gas plant near Palmyra, Syria, shows a Syrian man, who was known to friends and family as Hamdi Bouta, lying on the ground, surrounded by Russian-speaking men in military fatigues. It was unclear, however, whether that case would move forward after federal prosecutors working under the Trump administration dropped charges against Prigozhins St. Petersburg-based firm Concord Consulting and Management in connection with the case. The group's exact African footprint is disputed, but it's growing. Wagner expanded to Syria in 2015, tasked with bolstering President Bashar al-Assad and seizing oil and gas fields, American officials said. Activists argue the struggles for state transparency and national liberation are one and the same. It wasnt until November 2019, when further videos emerged, that journalists were able to identify the perpetrators as well as the victim. The reaction team sped toward the fight. It was quickly seized upon by open source investigators, who first identified the location of the video as the Shaer gas station near Homs and then pored over the video for clues to the mens identities. If Putin had hoped to weaken NATO, the very opposite has happened, with Finland and Sweden on the cusp of joining the transatlantic military alliance. Commanders of the rival militaries had long steered clear of the other by speaking through often-used deconfliction telephone lines. Online messages sent to him and his wife by the Guardian were not immediately returned on Thursday. Delivered Monday-Saturday. The Paris-based Syrian investigative news site Jesr Press was able to piece together the most detailed account of Boutas life and how he came to be captured by Russian mercenaries. At the plant, the commandos were pinned down by enemy artillery and burning through ammunition. Their presence, in the eastern region known as Donbas that is home to Russia-backed separatist groups, raises concerns, given the groups history. When the civil war began, he traveled to Lebanon to find construction work after the situation in Syria deteriorated and large parts of Deir Ezzor came under ISIS control, according to an account of Boutas final days given to lawyers by his family. At worst, officials and experts have said, it could plunge both countries into bloody conflict. A member of the group can be overheard discussing whether they should cover their faces before one says theres no point, as the video is not going to go anywhere., Amy Mackinnon is a national security and intelligence reporter at Foreign Policy. Watch the conversation or read the condensed transcript. The group is often described as President Vladimir Putin s off-the-books troops. The group sketched out activities like this as a standard mixture for Wagner, providing both military fighters, military and political and economic advice, and also securing business in the countries, often extracting raw materials, for businesses with ties to Wagner or Russia or both. The victim is reported to be Mohammad Taha al Ismail Abdallah of Deir ez-Zor, whom the contractors accused of deserting from the Syrian army. Family members of a former Russian prison inmate, who defected to Ukraine after being recruited by the Kremlin-linked private military group Wagner, have expressed horror over his apparent execution after a gruesome video emerged on Friday that showed him being repeatedly struck with a sledgehammer. He said he directed Gen. Joseph F. Dunford Jr., the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, for the force, then, to be annihilated.. The United States troops on the ground, now roughly 40 in all, braced their defenses as the mercenaries left their vehicles and headed toward the outpost on foot. Wagner's presence in CAR soon led to the departure of a French-led international peacekeeping force in the country, as was the case even more abruptly last year in Mali. Novaya Gazeta called on Russian law enforcement to investigate the case. They provide the Pentagons first public on-the-ground accounting of one of the single bloodiest battles the American military has faced in Syria since deploying to fight the Islamic State. On March 27, 2017, Bouta traveled across the border from Lebanon into Syria at the Beirut-Damascus crossing with a group of young men from his village. A new report by Frontline Forensics, a joint initiative of Arizona State University and the New America think tank, published on Tuesday explores the circumstances of Boutas death using company records and social media analysis. Captured wounded fighters of Russias Wagner mercenary group: Ilya, 30, left, and Mikhail, 35, in the Donetsk region of Ukraine on Monday. The GRU often directs and supports the group in combat, and the available evidence indicates close coordination in It's unclear if Russian investigative agencies have conducted, or intend to conduct, any such investigation. Anyone can read what you share. As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. There is a dynamic evolution in the fusion of Russian ultranationalist groups and Russian paramilitaries going on that nobody is really paying attention to or seeing yet, said Candace Rondeaux, a professor of practice in the School of Politics and Global Studies at Arizona State University and the author of the report. Wagner's fighters appeared in Libya in April 2019 when they joined the forces of a rebel general, Khalifa Haftar, after he launched an attack on the UN-backed The entity first emerged in 2014, during Russias annexation of Crimea. A monthly digest of the top articles read by FP subscribers. What can we glean from the current state of play on the battlefield? video Russia's notorious Wagner group admits to recruiting Zambian inmate who died fighting in Ukraine Prigozhin above all is a sharp-eyed opportunist. The small team of American troops was not harmed. Anyone can read what you share. Wagner has been reported as operating in a number of nations hit by conflict. It sheds new light on the networks operations and reveals how the killing became a rallying point for Russian ultranationalists online. The Wagner Group is believed to be owned by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a businessman with close links to Russian President Vladimir Putin often referred to as For the next three hours, American officials said, scores of strikes pummeled enemy troops, tanks and other vehicles. EvroPolis was sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury in 2018 for being owned or controlled by Prigozhin. What government officials are saying in public, and private, is fascinatingand full of contradictions. The clip of the brutal murder in Syria, apparently filmed in the summer of 2017, resurfaced this week in the wake of an investigation by Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta. The companies hit by sanctions included gold and diamond mining operations in the CAR and Sudan. Boutas slaying is symptomatic of the accountability vacuum in which the Wagner Group operates. Download the FP mobile app to read anytime, anywhere. When that failed, American troops fired warning shots at a group of vehicles and a howitzer. Ilya Novikov, one of the Russian attorneys who filed the ground-breaking legal complaint, said in a written statement that he and his co-counsel Petr Zaikin, decided to initiate the case after a demand for Russias Investigative Committee, the countrys top prosecutorial body, apparently fell flat. Since the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the United States Central Command has refined the amount of equipment, logistics, coordination and tactics required to mix weapons fired from both the air and ground. He said Russia seemed to be turning to them to bolster its troops in the east of Ukraine because the group already had experience fighting in the Donbas region for the past eight years. The Guardian has previously reported that Prigozhin was personally recruiting soldiers from Russias extensive penitentiary system in an attempt to compensate for acute shortages of personnel on the battlefield. A CAR radio station,Lengo Sengo, was also sanctioned on charges of spreading disinformation on Wagner's behalf. Late last November, videos of a gruesome killing went viral on Russian social networks. Snippets of the video had been posted online since 2017 but the full footage was uploaded last week to a closed VKontakte group for members of Wagner. Their faces are uncovered. Delivered Wednesday & Sunday. Its mercenaries have also fought in Ukraine and the Central African Republic, and are said to be active in Libya, Sudan and Mozambique. U.S. officials warned that the group was recruiting Syrians skilled in urban combat to fight in Ukraine. The Wagner Group is a very convenient fiction for a lot of people in Russia who both want to get rich and project power abroad, Rondeaux said. In the days leading up to the attack, and on opposite sides of the Euphrates River, Russia and the United States were backing separate offensives against the Islamic State in Syrias oil-rich Deir al-Zour Province, which borders Iraq. Our whole family was in tears watching the video he was murdered like an animal, Nuzhin said. The day began with little hint of the battle that was about to unfold. None of the Americans at the small outpost in eastern Syria about 40 by the end of the firefight were harmed. Its not clear how the videos ended up online or why the perpetrators chose to document the killing. Yevgeny Prigozhin is the man behind a mercenary force fighting for Russia in Ukraine. A billboard in Bangui with the slogan "The Central African Republic is hand in hand with Russia" (file photo), published what it claimed was the victim's name. At 3 p.m. the Syrian force began edging toward the Conoco plant. Contacted by Novaya Gazeta, relatives and friends of the Russian man, named as Stanislav D., either did not respond or denied any affiliation with him. Ukraines economy and infrastructure have been dealt blows that will take decades to recover from. Prigozhin, who had been charged by U.S. Special Counsel Robert Mueller in early 2018, was slapped with new U.S. Treasury Department sanctions on September 30, in an announcement that also included photographs of three jets and a 122-foot yacht that purportedly belongs to Prigozhin or his companies. More ways to stay updated on global news: By submitting your email, you agree to the Privacy Policy and Terms of Use and to receive email correspondence from us. The Wagner Group is a mercenary firm that has been heavily involved in the fighting in Ukraine. What will another year of war look like? by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Some of the fighters appeared to have been recruited from Syria and Libya, the Pentagons spokesman, John F. Kirby, has said. Relations between the United States and China seem to be getting frostier by the day. "I'm convinced this has nothing to do with the Russian military operation in Syria," Peskov told reporters. Expanding Influence The air was filled with dust and shrapnel. But Russian military officials said they had no control over the fighters assembling near the river even though American surveillance equipment monitoring radio transmissions had revealed the ground force was speaking in Russian. This week marks exactly one year since Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered his troops to invade Ukraine. The military dependence of the CAR administration on Wagner has translated into a very influential political role for the mercenary organization," the report said. The Ukraine Visitors wearing military camouflage at the Wagner Centre office building in St Petersburg. The Kremlin-backed Wagner Group will be exposed to legal proceedings for the first time after video emerged of man in Syria being beaten with a sledgehammer and then beheaded. Bouta is believed to have been killed in the spring of 2017, and a video of his death first emerged online in June 2017. South Africa and Russia deepen military ties, Ukraine updates: Zelenskyy calls for ICC Russia probe, More than mercenaries: Russia's Wagner Group in Africa, Russian troops step up fight to cut off Bakhmut supply lines, French court dismisses case against TotalEnergies, Pakistan: The school that's free for Afghan refugee children, New hurdles for sea rescuers in the Mediterranean, Tunisia: Presidential scapegoating stokes fear and support, Canada Soccer president resigns amid equal pay dispute, committed in the Central African Republic, Mali, Sudan, the most influential form of Russian engagement in Africa today, has also prompted the country to step up its diplomatic drive in Africa, Mali's ruling junta last year forced French troops out of the country soon after committing a coup and welcomed in Wagner forces, At a vote at the UN General Assembly this week. Governments are almost endlessly prone to throwing good money after bad. Jessica Chen Weiss, formerly a senior advisor for policy planning at the State Department under the Biden administration, makes the case that the United States is becoming consumed by competition with China, a strategy that could lead to dangerous conflict. Family members had confirmed his death to local press, saying he had returned to Syria from Lebanon in 2017 when he was summoned to fight but later deserted. Novaya Gazeta said it had first identified Stanislav D using online facial recognition software, then corroborated the results by showing he was a member of the private military company using a leaked copy of his passport. But he denied that Russia's armed forces had any connection to the incident. Bracing for an attack, the Green Berets prepared to launch the reaction force. Delivered Monday-Friday. Syrian fighters who support the government of President Bashar al-Assad at a hospital in the eastern city of Deir-al Zour in February. But beyond the goals of one leader in Moscow, it is also clear that Ukraine has suffered horrors of a historic nature. Youd better believe its terrifying, Rondeaux said. International Federation for Human Rights. In Syria, A Mutilated Corpse, Video Evidence, And New Scrutiny Two years after the United States clashed with some sort of Wagner Group contingent in Deir Ezzor, the United States government still doesnt know anything about the organizational structure of these military contingents, Rondeaux said. Russian corporate records and customs documents reviewed by C4ADS as well as EvroPolis company records provided by the London-based Dossier Center show that the company was offered a 25 percent share of the revenues of Syrian oil and gas fields it was able to seize from the Islamic State. A organizao teria sido fundada por volta de 2014, na Rssia, seu lder atual o ex-oficial do exrcito russo Dmitriy "Wagner" Valeryevich Utkin. Vagner and other Russian private military companies have helped advance Moscow's influence efforts in regions beyond the Middle East, targeting countries that are often rich with natural resources and vulnerable to political influence from the outside. It was the opening salvo in a nearly four-hour assault in February by around 500 pro-Syrian government forces including Russian mercenaries that threatened to inflame already-simmering tensions between Washington and Moscow. Jesr said the killing took place near the al-Shaer oil field in the Syrian province of Homs, which at the time of the incident, would have been under the control of the Russian-backed government of Assad. After the first video was anonymously posted in June 2017 three more were posted in November 2019 and began circulating widely on Russian social media platforms. Kremlin-backed mercenary soldiers who worked for the Wagner Group could be tested in the Russian courts for the very first time after an all-star team of human rights lawyers filed a case in Moscow accusing the militants of the torture and beheading of a man in Syria. What is the Wagner Group? Advertisement. Companies linked to the Wagner group are snapping up oil and gas leaseswith an eye to pumping influence, not oil. Mercenary activity that enables and secures these business interests has become the most visible manifestation of these networks. On his way back to Syria in 2017, he was arrested and drafted into the Syrian military. But Wagners work, which has reportedly been rewarded with oil concessions in Syria, has largely taken place in the shadows, and the video is a rare, shocking look at the groups actions in Syria. FPs Ravi Agrawal spoke with two of the very best Russia experts:Angela Stent, a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and the author ofPutins World: Russia Against the West and With the Rest, and Michael Kofman, the research program director of the Russia studies program at the Center for Naval Analyses. In an interview with the Russian human rights group Gulagu.net late on Sunday, Ilya Nuzhin said his family learned of their fathers death through Telegram, which left them horrified. In addition to their involvement in Syria, Libya, Central African Republic and Ukraine, Wagner operatives have also fought in Sudan, Mali and Mozambique, exerting Russian influence by proxy, doing the bidding of authoritarian leaders and, at times, seizing oil and gas fields or securing other material interests. WebHistria Fundao. Within days of the second tranche of videos being posted by open source investigators on Twitter, reporters with al-Jessr Press, a Paris-based media outlet that reports on Syria, published the very first account of Boutas killing. Ilya Nuzhin, Yevgenys son, confirmed to the Guardian on Monday that the man in the video was his father but declined to give further comments, citing security concerns. Dmitry Peskov, a spokesman for President Vladimir Putin, said he had not had time to watch the video. The American commandos took cover, then ran behind dirt berms to fire anti-tank missiles and machine guns at the advancing column of armored vehicles. U.S. forces clashed with pro-Syrian government forces, the majority of which are believed to have been Russian mercenaries, in Syrias Deir Ezzor province in 2018. The researchers social network analysis also revealed substantial cross-affiliation with Rusich, a Russian neo-Nazi paramilitary group that has operated in eastern Ukraine. But researchers from groups such as Bellingcat and the Conflict Intelligence Team, as well as Russian journalists most notably from, An analysis of Russian social media groups for followers of the Wagner Group as well as the friend networks of individuals who shared details of Boutas murder online revealed a burgeoning online movement of Russian ultranationalists with an abiding interest in mercenary culture who claimed to have served in Russian military units,. The mercenary, who was been identified as Stanislav D by the Novaya Gazeta newspaper, is a former police officer from the Stavropol region in southern Russia. In another part of the video that originally surfaced in 2017, the four men laugh to a soundtrack of Russian rock music as they use a sledgehammer to crush the hand of a man shown pinned to the ground wearing bloodied civilian clothes in what appears to be an industrial zone. It operates in a situation of opacity, theres a real lack of transparency and thats the whole point, said Sorcha MacLeod, chair of the United Nations Working Group on the use of mercenaries, which has scrutinized the group. U.S. forces clashed with pro-Syrian government forces, the, of which are believed to have been Russian mercenaries, in Syrias Deir Ezzor province in 2018. With Russia suffering heavy losses, according to U.S. intelligence, Mr. Putin is sending battle-hardened reinforcements with experience into Ukraine, according to experts, including Jeremy Fleming, the director of Britains electronic surveillance agency. I Was Moscows Chief Rabbi. As the Green Berets and Marines neared the Conoco plant around 11:30 p.m., they were forced to stop. to the research by Frontline Forensics, which was published by New America. The Kremlin has repeatedly denied any connections to Russian private military security contractors operating in Syria. But beyond the goals of one leader in Moscow, it is also clear that Ukraine has suffered horrors of a historic nature. Ukraines economy and infrastructure have been dealt blows that will take decades to recover from. In the interviews, he also criticised the Russian leadership and expressed his desire to join the Ukrainian forces and fight against Moscow. A Russian-speaking man who filmed the torture and killing of a prisoner in Syria has been identified as a member of Wagner, a Russian private military company with ties to the Kremlin that has aggressively expanded into the Middle East and Africa in recent years. Media and think tank reports indicate that natural gas extraction by EvroPolis, a firm Prigozhin holds a stake in according to U.S. authorities, generated about $162 million from al-Shaer and several other nearby gas fields in 2017, the same year Bouta was killed. There have also been widespread reports of Wagner recruiting foreign convicts in prisons across Russia, including citizens from the five central Asian nations. The men, who appear to be drunk in the video, sought to hide their identities by covering their faces. .. On the tenth anniversary of the Syrian revolution last year, a complaint against the Russian private military company (PMC) Wagner was filed in Russian courts, the first case ever brought against the group. Osechkin said all signs pointed to Wagners involvement in the killing and said he planned to send a request to Russias authorities to launch a criminal case. It has since been hailing Russia as contributing to an end to post-colonial French influence in the country. The U.S. government has said that the organization is financed by Yevgeny V. Prigozhin, a Russian businessman and a close associate of Mr. Putin. But as well as disputing Wagner's presence, Russia said it would "actively participate in collective efforts to stabilize the situation" and "develop a multifaceted cooperation with Burkina Faso," including potentially training the country's military. Eight of the 11 individuals and all seven entities sanctions were linked to Wagner's largest and longest-runningknown operations in Africa, in the Central African Republic and Sudan. Increasingly, theyve become more formalized and have started acting more like Western military contractors. These soldiers are likely to be used as cannon fodder to try to limit Russian military losses, he has said. The Kremlin said on Thursday it had no knowledge of the incident. Mr. Utkin is said to have chosen Wagner to honor the composer, who was a favorite of Hitlers. Is Weiss correct? Although on Western radars for some time, the group and the extent of its activities has come more clearly to light sinceRussia's invasion of Ukraine with Moscow no longer flatly denying the organization's existence, and Prigozhin having come forward and confirmed suspicions of his leadership role in the group. Sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury in 2018 for being owned or controlled by Prigozhin of contradictions shaping on. Could plunge both countries into bloody conflict snapping up oil and gas fields, American troops was not harmed private!, which was published by new America battle that was about to.... Honor the composer, who was a favorite of Hitlers Prigozhin above is! Edging toward the Conoco plant around 11:30 p.m., they were forced to.. Influence, not oil the fighters as a pro-regime force, loyal to President Bashar al-Assad of Syria Nuzhin! Influence the air was filled with dust and shrapnel were harmed told reporters Pentagons spokesman, John F. Kirby has! 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