Yevgeny Prigozhin, commander of Russia’s Wagner private army that has been fighting alongside Russian forces in Ukraine, has called on Russian forces to join his armed rebellion against the nation’s military leadership.
Videos posted to social media appeared to show Prigozhin’s forces traveling by convoy to Rostov-on-Don, home to the southern region headquarters of the Russian military, and then storming the building while civilian onlookers stood casually by, some of them smoking.
Wagner convoy moving through a Russian checkpoint, reportedly in Rostov Oblast, hauler with a BMP-3 IFV, 4x KAMAZ 5350, 3x Bukhanka, 2x KamAZ fuel tanker pic.twitter.com/3xmAGMMmYi
— OSINTtechnical (@Osinttechnical) June 24, 2023
BREAKING:
The Wagner Group is storming the headquarters of the Russian Defense Ministry in the city of Rostov.
The military coup continues pic.twitter.com/91yqLti4AG
— Visegrád 24 (@visegrad24) June 24, 2023
A later tweet purported to show a video of Prigozhin claiming to have taken control of the city and inviting Russian Defense Minister Shoigu and Chief of General Staff Gerasimov to meet with him at the headquarters building now under his control.
Yevgeny Prigozhin speaking once again from the Southern Military District Headquarters in the City of Rostov-on-Don, stating that Wagner has Occupied all of the Military Installations across the City including the Airfield to insure that the Russian Air Force is Attacking the… pic.twitter.com/S3krmZqEg6
— OSINTdefender (@sentdefender) June 24, 2023
The Western Journal has been as of yet unable to independently verify the authenticity of these videos or the summaries of their contents.
Meanwhile, according to The Washington Post, Russian President Vladimir Putin made a brief speech condemning Prigozhin and made his own call to the Russian people to oppose him, comparing the mercenary commander to a terrorist: “Everyone who deliberately embarked on the path of betrayal, who prepared an armed rebellion, chose the path of blackmail and terrorist methods — they will suffer inevitable punishment.”
Prigozhin has also been charged with armed insurrection by the National Anti-Terrorism Committee, which is part of the Federal Security Services, NPR reported.
Prigozhin has argued, however, that his forces are only seeking “justice” for a missile strike that killed some of his men at the order of “evil” Russian military leadership, and though he vowed to march his forces to Moscow, he claimed he was not looking to overthrow Putin’s government.
“Presidential power, the government, the police and Russian guard will work as usual,” he said, according to the BBC. “This is not a military coup, but a march of justice. Our actions do not interfere with the troops in any way.”
“The Ministry of Defence is trying to deceive the public, deceive the president and tell a story that there was some crazy aggression by Ukraine, that — together with the whole Nato bloc — Ukraine was planning to attack us,” Prigozhin said Friday.
In reality, he argued, the war was started because Shoigu, the defense minister, wanted to “become a Marshall.”
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
