Russian President Vladimir Putin has given a new "strange explanation" for the death of the head of the Wagner paramilitary group, Yevgeny Prigozhin, which puts the blame on Prigozhin himself, the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) said.
According to a report in the Russian newspaper Kommersant, Putin said that the head of the Russian Investigative Committee, Alexander Bastrikin, told him that grenade fragments were found in the bodies of the victims on board Prigozhin's plane, which crashed in August after taking off from Moscow. Russian officials previously confirmed that all 10 people on board the aircraft, including Prigozhin and Wagner mercenary group lieutenant Dmitry Udkin, were killed.
Putin, who was speaking during a news conference at the Valdai Debate Club on Thursday, also claimed there were no external factors that caused the crash, according to the investigation committee's examination. He also suggested that although it has not been proved that there was alcohol or drugs on board the aircraft when it crashed, tests should be conducted on the bodies of the victims to ascertain whether they were under the influence of drugs.
"Unfortunately, no tests were carried out to determine the presence of alcohol or drugs in the blood of the victims. Although we know that after the famous events at the company in St. Petersburg, the [Russian security service] discovered not only 10 billion [rubles] in cash, but also 5 kilograms of cocaine," Putin said, referring to the public raid on Wagner's mansion in July after the Wagner Group's failed revolt against Moscow. "In my opinion, this examination should have taken place."
ISW called Putin's explanation for Prigozhin's death "bizarre" in his latest assessment of the war in Ukraine, noting that the Kremlin leader seemed to imply that a grenade could have exploded inside the plane before it crashed.
"Putin's bizarre explanation for the plane crash is most likely an attempt to blame Prigozin for the deaths of himself and his comrades and to further embarrass him among his remaining supporters," ISW added.
Putin was notably silent in the days following Prigozhin's death, and ISW previously assessed that the Kremlin was "almost certainly" to blame. Telegram channels linked to Wagner also claimed that Prigozhin's plane had been hit by Russian anti-aircraft defences.
Since the death of their leader, Wagner's troops have been spotted stalking Russia as some of the private mercenaries are being evacuated from Ukraine. Prigozhin's son, Pavel, is also reportedly in charge of Wagner's elite unit, which is expected to return to the front line amid Ukraine's ongoing counter-offensive.
The Kremlin has claimed that the private military company was absorbed by the Russian Defense Ministry after Prigozhin's failed uprising, and Putin also told reporters on Thursday that Wagner no longer exists in Russia, according to Russian state news agency TASS.
"It was a journalistic name - a private military company," Putin said, referring to the Wagner Group. "There are no private military companies in Russia because there is no law on private military companies. In our country there are not and never have been."
Putin added that Wagner's fight alongside Russian troops in Ukraine was "clumsy because it was not based on the law," but added that he had no objection to private mercenaries signing contracts with the Defense Ministry "because people acted voluntarily and we saw that we fought heroically."
