WAR IN UKRAINE. If Evgueni Prigojine, the leader of the Wagner group, called on his men to retreat after marching towards Moscow, the impact of this rebellion could be strong on the conflict in Ukraine.
Will a short 24-hour rebellion have significant consequences for the rest of the war in Ukraine? What did Evgueni Prigojine get from Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, transformed into a mediator, to agree to give up and push back his troops who seemed to be heading towards Moscow after taking control of Rostov on the Don? All day Saturday, June 24, as fragmented information came from Russia, eyes naturally turned to Kiev and Ukraine, where war has been raging since February 2022 and where a Ukrainian counter-offensive has begun for some days.
From midday, the Ukrainian authorities played it safe while stressing the importance of the rebellion of the Wagner group. President Volodymyr Zelensky didn’t mince his words when commenting on the situation at midday, saying that whoever “chooses the path of evil will self-destruct”, and targeting Vladimir Putin sending “hundreds of thousands of people to war to finally barricade himself in the Moscow region to protect himself from those he himself has armed” before arguing about the weakness of Russia and the role of Ukraine “capable of protecting the Europe”.
While eyes were on Russia, the war continued on the Ukrainian front. The Minister of Defense announced progress in the East, confirmed by the Deputy Minister of Defense in a message posted on the Telegram network. “Today, the group of troops from the East launched an offensive in several directions at once”, especially around Bakhmout.
This conflict between Moscow and the Wagner Group took place in the context of the war waged by the Russians in Ukraine since February 24, 2022. Since then, the clashes have been in full swing and the Ukrainian counter-offensive has been underway. At least 7,000 Ukrainian citizens and several thousand Russian and Ukrainian soldiers lost their lives during this conflict. More than five million Ukrainians have fled the war since February 2022.
