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By Isabel van Brugen
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Wagner Group boss Yevgeny Prigozhin may still be protected by some "security guarantees" given that he is allegedly operating freely in Russia, a U.S.-based think tank has said.
The Institute for the Study of War (ISW), in its latest analysis of the conflict in Ukraine, weighed in on Alexander Lukashenko's surprise announcement that Prigozhin was in Russia, not Belarus, despite the deal brokered by the Belarusian leader for his—and his mercenaries'—sanctuary in the country.
"As of this morning, the Wagner fighters, very serious ones, are still in the camps they'd withdrawn to after Bakhmut," Lukashenko said Thursday. "As for Yevgeny Prigozhin, he's in St. Petersburg. Or perhaps this morning he flew to Moscow. Or perhaps he's somewhere else. But he's not in Belarus."
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Though specific details remain unclear, under the deal that ended the mutiny in late June, the charges against Prigozhin and his Wagner Group fighters were dropped and they were to relocate to Belarus.
The Wagner boss' alleged presence in Russia raises questions about why Putin seems to have let him off the hook for a rebellion that saw his fighters march on Moscow, and why the Kremlin appears not to be concerned about whether he is sticking to the terms of the agreement.
Following Lukashenko's statement, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov brushed off a question about Prigozhin's whereabouts, saying that the Russian government has neither the "ability" nor the "desire" to follow the Wagner Group chief's movements.
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The ISW said that Prigozhin's ability to freely operate in Russia suggests that he is still either "protected by some security guarantees and/or that the Kremlin continues to prioritize undermining his reputation in Russia over targeting Prigozhin physically or legally."
While the Wagner Group leader hasn't been seen in public since the end of his uprising, pro-Kremlin media released images this week purported to be taken during a raid by Russian security services on his St. Petersburg mansion. They showed gold bars, weapons, cash and a collection of wigs seized.
Kyiv has said that Russia intends to assassinate Prigozhin over the failed mutiny. Ukraine's head of defense intelligence, Major General Kyrylo Budanov, said Kyiv knew both about the mutiny plans and an ongoing plot by Russia's intelligence agency, the Federal Security Service (FSB), to assassinate him.
Those claims were brushed off by Lukashenko on Thursday, who said that neither he nor President Vladimir Putin wanted to assassinate Prigozhin. He also dismissed suggestions that the Russian leader might attempt to kill Prigozhin in the future, according to the ISW.
"It's great that Russian authorities don't really care about a person who launched an armed mutiny against them," Anton Gerashchenko, an adviser to Ukraine's Ministry of Internal Affairs, tweeted. "So where is he exactly? With the money, weapons and Wagner mercenaries?"
The ISW assessed on June 27 that Putin "has likely decided that he cannot directly eliminate Prigozhin without making him a martyr for causes concerning the Russian Ministry of Defense's (MoD) mishandling of the invasion."
Mikhail Khodorkovsky, a self-exiled former Russian tycoon, has told Newsweek that Putin is likely in a "fix" over the matter.
The Russian president decided not to risk retaliating against Prigozhin and his fighters with force, because the people Putin could have used to defend him and the regime from the Wagner boss "could actually turn their arms against the regime itself in the opposite direction."
"If he doesn't punish anyone for the mutiny, then the plan for another Prigozhin-type mutiny occurring is going to be much more likely," said Khodorkovsky, who headed the energy company Yukos before he spent a decade in prison in Russia until 2013 for what critics said were politically motivated charges.
"You start punishing people, then you could suddenly find out that half of the active army are siding with Prigozhin and then by that, you could actually promote a greater mutiny and much greater clash," he added.
Newsweek has contacted Russia's Foreign Ministry by email for comment.
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