Russian authorities said on Wednesday that no Russian citizen will be extradited, and are ruling out sending Wagner Group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin to the United States to be held responsible for the crimes he is accused of.
“Every Russian citizen (…) has the right to count on Russia’s help to protect him against illegal attempts to make him criminally liable abroad”Moscow Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said when asked about the possibility of Prigozhin being extradited to the United States.
US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller acknowledged Tuesday that Washington would like to see the leader of the Wagner Group in US courts to face the “crimes he is accused of” both in Ukraine and Africa.
The Wagner group, led by Prigozhin, kicked off an uprising Friday evening with the irresistible capture of the Russian city of Rostov, the headquarters of the army’s southern command, with the intention of moving to Moscow to remove military leadership in response to a alleged attack. bombing of mercenaries in Ukraine.
In the middle of the conflict with the Kremlin and 200 kilometers from Moscow province, a military column of the Wagner group turned around on Saturday afternoon, thanks to the mediation of Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, in an agreement to stop the uprising, amnesty for sending mercenaries and exiling Prigozhin and some of his men to Belarus and offering others the chance to join Russia’s regular forces.
Maria Zakharova stressed that Russia will resolve the situation with Prigozhin and his mercenaries without outside interference.
“Those who wanted to show their support did, those who wanted to help helped. We will remember all this, we will take note of it and we will not forget it”he claimed.
In his posts over the past few days, Prigozhin said publicly that the uprising was not aimed at overthrowing the government of Russian President Vladimir Putin, but at ousting Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Chief of Staff Valeri Gerasimov, whom he has repeatedly accused of incompetence in leading the invasion of Ukraine, which began on February 24 last year, and even of high treason.
The Wagner group led the way from the beginning of the invasion and played a leading role in the capture of Bakhmut, in Donetsk province (east), in the longest and bloodiest battle of the war in Ukraine, at the cost of high casualties, amid of Prigozhin’s open accusations of lack of military support from Moscow.
Source: DN
