Between 200 to 300 fighters were killed in the battle, including scores of Russian mercenaries, to be working in the region to seize control of a nearby gas plant on behalf of EvroPolis. Journalist Ahmed Tayseer al-Issa, spent years documenting the conflict in Daraa and the crimes of the regime. A team of about 30 Delta Force soldiers and Rangers from the Joint Special Operations Command were working alongside Kurdish and Arab forces at a small dusty outpost next to a Conoco gas plant, near the city of Deir al-Zour. At worst, officials and experts have said, it could plunge both countries into bloody conflict. video Russia's notorious Wagner group admits to recruiting Zambian inmate who died fighting in Ukraine Prigozhin above all is a sharp-eyed opportunist. A recent investigative report on the Wagner Group's activities in Africa surmised that it "has rapidly become the most influential form of Russian engagement in Africa today," politically, economically and militarily. Join FPs Ravi Agrawal for a wide-ranging conversation with U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai on the Biden administrations trade and economic policiesand the impacts they have on the world. The video, which appears to have been taken in 2017, showed several men in military-style clothing beating a prisoner with a sledgehammer, then beheading him, amputating his arms with a sappers trowel and setting his body on fire using gasoline or another accelerant. They would face asset freezes and a travel ban. The newspaper also offered to hand over materials acquired to Russian law enforcement. Commanders briefed pilots and ground crews. Afterwards, the men posed for a photograph with the suspended body, across the torso of which they wrote: For the VDV [Russian airborne forces] and an out-of-focus word that appears to say razvedka, a term for military intelligence. Russian government forces in Syria maintain they were not involved in the battle. Novaya Gazeta called on Russian law enforcement to investigate the case. The latest news, analysis, and data from the country each week. Syrian fighters who support the government of President Bashar al-Assad at a hospital in the eastern city of Deir-al Zour in February. By one estimate from Harvard University, more than 130,000 Ukrainian soldiers have been killed or severely wounded, in addition to the deaths of more than 7,000 Ukrainian civilians. Russian trucks heading to Deir al-Zour, an oil-rich Syrian province that borders Iraq, last year. Youre on the list! Subscribers can send in questions in advance. Apostols family have reportedly confirmed that he worked as a private security contractor in Syria, and that he was one of several hundred Russians killed in a U.S. airstrike in the northeastern Syrian province of Deir Ezzor. Were going to Moscow, to their territory, to their courts, and to their jurisdiction, Darwish said. On his way back to Syria in 2017, he was arrested and drafted into the Syrian military. environment on the planet from our adversaries, Gen. Tony Thomas, the head of United States Special Operations Command, said recently, referring to electronic warfare. up as tough on Beijing, even seeking to contain the rise of the worlds second-biggest economy. Boutas slaying is symptomatic of the accountability vacuum in which the Wagner Group operates. The case is being lodged jointly by lawyers and advocates associated with Darwishs organization, the Memorial Human Rights Center in Moscow, and the International Federation for Human Rights in Paris. Russia Forced Me to Flee. Vagner is one of the best-known of several Russian private military companies that have come into being over the past decade. Delivered Monday-Saturday. 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. 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. EvroPolis was sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury in 2018 for being owned or controlled by Prigozhin. The European Union on Saturday announced additional sanctions against Russia's Wagner Group mercenary and economic organization for 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. [20] [29] [30]Utkin um veterano da Primeira e Segunda Guerra na Chechnia.At 2008 ou 2013, Utkin fez parte da Spetsnaz (foras especiais) do GRU onde chegou a patente de tenente-coronel The report also revealed that at least one of the Russian-speaking men in the video had fought in the embattled region of Donbas in eastern Ukraine before traveling to Syria to work for a contingent affiliated to the Wagner Group. Elements of these networks have been identified by researchers and journalists through their overlapping ownership structures, personnel, and supply chains. To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video. The men, who appear to be drunk in the video, sought to hide their identities by covering their faces. There have also been widespread reports of Wagner recruiting foreign convicts in prisons across Russia, including citizens from the five central Asian nations. The contractors train at a GRU compound in Molkino, a village in southwestern Russia, and the SBU has identified over 25 Russian officers who instruct Wagner contractors in skills ranging from artillery to combat engineering. This style of hybrid warfare has become a cornerstone of Russias efforts to project its interests abroad. Delivered Thursday. In September, Prigozhin, known as Putins chef because his catering business hosted dinners attended by the Russian president, admitted to founding Wagner, a link he has previously repeatedly denied. Ahrar Houran, which he helped to found, confirmed the news. The small team of American troops was not harmed. 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 Bouta is believed to have been killed in the spring of 2017, and a video of his death first emerged online in June 2017. Stroytransgaz, or STG, the company headed by Kremlin-insider Timchenko, is one of the largest such investors, and in February it secured a $22 million production sharing agreement with the Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's government, according to The Syria Report, an online journal that tracks economic developments in the country. Ukraines economy and infrastructure have been dealt blows that will take decades to recover from. And how might that be impacting the world? The company is widely believed to be controlled by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a longtime associate of Vladimir Putin who once served as the Russian president's chef. The most pointed criticisms of the war are coming from those charged with fighting it. What will another year of war look like? After his brief stint in the Syrian Arab Army, Bouta went to work in the construction industry, working primarily as a bricklayer. The Russian high command in Syria assured us it was not their people, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis told senators in testimony last month. Saturday's additional sanctions were decided "in view of the international dimension and gravity of the group's activities, as well as its destabilizing impact on the countries where it is active,"said a statement from the European Council. The mercenaries earn of a share of the production proceeds from the oil fields they reclaim, officials said. 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. Almost a year later, the court found that the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation, which had the power to open The outcome of the battle, and much of its mechanics, suggest that the Russian mercenaries and their Syrian allies were in the wrong part of the world to try a simple, massed assault on an American military position. The entity first emerged in 2014, during Russias annexation of Crimea. Russia 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. United States F-22 stealth fighter jets above Syria, where the prospect of Russian military forces and American troops colliding has long been feared as the Cold War adversaries take opposing sides in the countrys seven-year civil war. The sudden hit on Russia's economic ties with the West since invading Ukraine has also prompted the country to step up its diplomatic drive in Africa. If for some reason the case does not go forward in Moscow, Darwish said, it is likely that he, Novikov and others will take the case to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, France. Dmitry Peskov, a spokesman for President Vladimir Putin, said he had not had time to watch the video. One of the individuals sanctioned on Saturday came under an EU sanctions regime for Mali specifically. By one estimate from Harvard University, more than 130,000 Ukrainian soldiers have been killed or severely wounded, in addition to the deaths of more than 7,000 Ukrainian civilians. Footage of the summary killing of Yevgeny Nuzhin was posted over the weekend by the Wagner-linked Telegram channel Grey Zone. For the first 15 minutes, American military officials called their Russian counterparts and urged them to stop the attack. 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. Advertisement. Following his capture by Ukrainian forces in September, Nuzhin gave a series of interviews in the country, in which he said he had joined the Wagner group to get out of prison and that he quickly hatched a plan to surrender to Ukraine. to the research by Frontline Forensics, which was published by New America. What we saw was an astounding number of people who would pass this video around, talk about it, or adopt poses from their video as their profile photo, Rondeaux said. A BBC Russian investigation in 2018 highlighted the deaths of Russian mercenaries fighting in Syria. Now it wants an end to sanctions. Questions remain about exactly who the Russian mercenaries were, and why they attacked. Russia has played all sides in the conflict to get a seat at the negotiating table. Journalists, open-source researchers, and other observers have tracked Russian military companies to operations in the Central African Republic, Mozambique, and Libya. According to Jesr, the man was captured by Russian forces after a desertion attempt from the Syrian Army. According to one Russian human rights group, Wagner has recruited more than 20,000 prisoners to fight in Ukraine so far. Vagner's operations have always been shrouded in secrecy, but its role in Syria came into the spotlight in February 2018 when U.S. military commanders launched a massive ground and air assault against a column of fighters and weaponry in the eastern province of Deir al-Zor. Wagner Group The brutal torture and beheading in video from Syria, according to the Kremlin, none of Putin's business. The other two Wagner-affiliated individuals sanctioned were suspected of war crimes in Ukraine, after reports of the organization having to move some of its fighting forces from African countries like Libya and Sudan to reinforce closer to Russia in recent months. At least one Marine exposed himself to incoming fire as he used a missile guidance computer to find targets locations and pass them on to the commandos calling in the airstrikes. 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 father of four from Syrias Deir Ezzor governorate, Bouta travelled to Lebanon in 2016 in search of work in the construction industry as large swaths of the region came under Islamic State control. Delivered Wednesday. 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. Among the EU's latest package of Russian sanctions, members of the Wagner Group mercenary company were included for alleged crimes committed in Africa. The group is often described as President Vladimir Putin s off-the-books troops. 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. It wasnt until November 2019, when further videos emerged, that journalists were able to identify the perpetrators as well as the victim. Rather than being a single organization, Wagner is an opaque network of titular companies and private military contractors that simultaneously further the Kremlins interests abroad while lining the pockets of those involved by gaining access to lucrative energy and natural resources mining contracts in the countries in which they operate. New Report Exposes Brutal Methods of Russias Wagner Group. They are the Swiss Army knives of modern Russian warfare and serve as force multipliers, arms merchants, trainers of local military and security personnel, and political consultants, according to a recent. Delivered Thursday. Late last November, videos of a gruesome killing went viral on Russian social networks. 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,. 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. Who Is Vagner? The Novaya Gazeta report added more clarity to an incident that prompted anger and confusion when evidence of it first surfaced. "In exchange for access to natural resources principally diamonds and gold Wagner has provided President Faustin Archange-Touadera with military and political support, which has proven pivotal in sustaining his embattled presidency against an onslaught of rebel groups. Click + to receive email alerts when new stories are published on. 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. 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. 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. And at a minimum, squaring off in crowded battlefields has added to heightened tensions between Russia and the United States as they each seek to exert influence in the Middle East. Gruesome Soundtrack You may opt out at any time. In the video, the men urge each other on to greater violence, telling one to cut harder while beheading the victim. Is Weiss correct? The Guardian checked the results independently using the facial recognition software FindClone and found the same results. Hopefully, this will open the door for all the crimes committed by the Wagner Group not only in Syria, said Mazen Darwish, one of several human rights activists pressing for justice in the case and director general of the Syrian Center for Media and Freedom of Expression. Yevgeny Prigozhin (left) serves food to Vladimir Putin in 2011. Right now in Syria, were in the most aggressive E.W. Wagner Group hired guns hammer a deserter to death Videotaped and shown on the internet, execution is a flesh-and-blood metaphor for the botched Ukraine invasion by Daniel Williams November 17, 2022 Print Yevgeny Nuzhin is pictured alive, before his executioner smashed his skull with a sledgehammer. None of the Americans at the small outpost in eastern Syria about 40 by the end of the firefight were harmed. American intelligence officials say that the Wagner Group, known by the nickname of the retired Russian officer who leads it, is in Syria to seize oil and gas fields and protect them on behalf of the Assad government. The mercenaries loosely coordinate with the Russian military in Syria, although Wagners leaders have reportedly received awards in the Kremlin, and its mercenaries are trained at the Russian Defense Ministrys bases. A handful of Marines ran ammunition to machine guns and Javelin missile launchers scattered along the berms and wedged among the trucks. An hour later, the enemy fighters had started to retreat and the American troops stopped firing. What can we glean from the current state of play on the battlefield? Theyre testing us every day., How a 4-Hour Battle Between Russian Mercenaries and U.S. Explore the benefits included in your subscription. A half-hour later, the Russian mercenaries and Syrian forces struck. 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. WebIts also the call sign of the groups unconfirmed leader, Dmitry Utkin, a former Russian military intelligence lieutenant, Wagner fan and suspected neo-Nazi. "I'm at risk. are assisting Somali soldiers fighting Al Shabab, and by a health care system that utterly failed him, The case has irritated U.S. relations with a crucial military ally, four Russian citizens but perhaps dozens more. This week, Moscow denied reports of Wagner already being operative in Burkina Faso another West African country that recently underwent a coup, fell out with former colonial power France, and is showing no sign of a return to democratic rule. "Yet, [private military companies] also pose substantial risks for a regime determined to keep a lid on domestic outcry over its military adventurism and to manage blowback," the report said. At some point in late March or early April, he escaped on foot from the T4 air base in Homs. 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. They cant say that this is just a political issue or propaganda because we are bringing this case in Russian courts, under Russian law. Delivered Wednesday & Sunday. It sheds new light on the networks operations and reveals how the killing became a rallying point for Russian ultranationalists online. A curated selection of our very best long reads. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty 2023 RFE/RL, Inc. All Rights Reserved. A video surfaced on social media showing 2 #Wagner mercenaries torturing, beheading & lynching-on-fire a #Syria -n army defector in 2017, 'just for fun.' 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. And neither the United States government understands how terrifying it is nor do its European allies.. After more than a year of government stonewalling and dodging allegations about the case, advocates for the victim say, Russian authorities will now be forced to go on record no matter what. An image uploaded to social media shortly before the article was published shows four men posing before a decapitated body in what appears to be the same spot shown in the videos. 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. Their faces are uncovered. Nuzhin betrayed his people, betrayed his comrades, betrayed consciously, he said. Kremlin-linked private military group posted video on Telegram of apparent execution in Russia of Yevgeny Nuzhin. 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. With Putins help, Assad has constrained the capacity of the United Nations to deliver health supplies in opposition-controlled territory, which faces rising risk of the coronavirus. Late last November, videos of a gruesome killing went viral on Russian social networks. 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. by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. So unused to being challenged, the United States has become so filled with anxiety over China that sober responses are becoming nearly impossible. Having first appeared in 2014 in eastern Ukraine, where Wagner fighters trained and fought alongside separatist rebels against the Ukrainian army, the groups operatives have since cropped up everywhere from Venezuela to the Central African Republic, Syria, and Libya. The private Russian military force, which has close ties to President Vladimir Putin and has been used in war zones across the world, is expanding its presence in Ukraine. This has absolutely no relation to Russian soldiers, no matter what is being published about it, said Dmitry Peskov, a spokesman for Vladimir Putin. Prigozhin, who is under western sanctions for his role in Wagner, on Sunday voiced his approval for the killing, calling Nuzhin a traitor. Nuzhin, 55, had been serving a 24-year prison sentence for a murder he committed in 1999 when he was freed in July and conscripted into Wagner, a notorious military group run by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a powerful Russian businessman and a close ally of Vladimir Putin. Tonight, his family announced they had received news of his death under torture in Sednaya Prison. 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. 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. In the American air operations center at Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar, and at the Pentagon, confounded military officers and intelligence analysts watched the scene unfold. Russia. Investigative paper wants atrocities of alleged Russian mercenaries in Syria probed after graphic VIDEO Yevgeny Prigozhin is the man behind a mercenary force fighting for Russia in Ukraine. They beat his extremities with a sledgehammer before decapitating him, setting his body on fire and posing for photographs with his remains. He has been referred to as Putins chef because of his catering business, which has staged elaborate state banquets for Mr. Putin. Bouta later got in touch with his brother-in-law directly and told him that members of the Syrian Arab Army had taken him to the al-Draij military camp, a well-known deployment hub for Wagner Group fighters. Join FPs Ravi Agrawal for a frank discussion about the Biden administrations China policy and alternatives that it ought to consider. 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 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. Theres a trend or pattern around what happens when Wagner is involved in an armed conflict, Dr. MacLeod said. The newspaper said it had also obtained an application form he had filled out for Wagner and a copy of a non-disclosure agreement he had signed. The Wagner Group: Russia's Blackwater TRT World 2.02M subscribers Subscribe 3.9K 321K views 2 years ago From Ukraine to Syria to the Central African He has reported for The New York Times in Moscowand has written for The Guardian, Politico, The New Republic, and Foreign Policy. In Syria, A Mutilated Corpse, Video Evidence, And New Scrutiny For Russian Mercenaries. By signing up, I agree to the Privacy Policy and Terms of Use and to occasionally receive special offers from Foreign Policy. But, a federal arrest warrant issued for Prigozhin in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 16 would seem to indicate renewed interest at the Department of Justice in seeing Prigozhin brought to account. Mercenaries from the Wagner Group in Bangui, Central African Republic, in 2019. relying on tens of thousands of inexperienced conscripts. standing, Ukrainians are determined to keep fighting, and the West has so far stayed resolute in its support of Ukraine. The Conoco outpost was hit with a mixture of tank fire, large artillery and mortar rounds, the documents show. 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. 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. Unconfirmed reports said Nuzhin had been part of a recent Russian-Ukrainian prisoner exchange, news that has led to concerns among human rights groups. Roughly 20 miles away, at a base known as a mission support site, a team of Green Berets and a platoon of infantry Marines stared at their computer screens, watching drone feeds and passing information to the Americans at the gas plant about the gathering fighters. 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. The barrage of artillery was too dangerous to drive through until airstrikes silenced the enemys howitzers and tanks. Relations between the United States and China seem to be getting frostier by the day. "The advent of the digital age means [such companies'] activities are often hidden in plain sight, and disinformation is no longer a fail-safe remedy when the secrecy of covert operations is compromised.". .. 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. Join in-depth conversations and interact with foreign-policy experts with. Then as now, the Kremlin denied any ties to Vagner, but the incident put major pressure on Russia to explain the presence of private mercenaries. Back at the mission support site, the Green Berets and Marines were preparing a small reaction force roughly 16 troops in four mine-resistant vehicles in case they were needed at the Conoco plant. The Wagner Group itself was already placed under EU sanctions in 2021, the US recently labeled it a "transnational criminal organization.". WASHINGTON The artillery barrage was so intense that the American commandos dived into foxholes for protection, emerging covered in flying dirt and debris to fire back at a column of tanks advancing under the heavy shelling. The details of the Feb. 7 firefight were gleaned from interviews and documents newly obtained by The New York Times. Initially, Russian officials said only four Russian citizens but perhaps dozens more were killed; a Syrian officer said around 100 Syrian soldiers had died. Its a really adaptable network, which makes it hard to target, but also hard to talk about, said Margolin of C4ADS. 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. The Wagner Group has achieved near-mythical status in the Russian and international press in recent years for its role in Russias interference efforts abroad, but there is no evidence that a single registered entity called Wagner exists, said Jack Margolin, a senior analyst with the nonprofit Center for Advanced Defense Studies (C4ADS), which provided analytical support for the report.