Gold, guns, disguises: what police found in Yevgeny Prigozhin’s mansion
As President Lukashenko insists Yevgeny Prigozhin is ‘absolutely free’ in Russia, a police raid on his St Petersburg mansion reveals the opulence, arrogance and paranoia of the Wagner chief | WATCH
Yevgeny Prigozhin is still in Russia, the Belarusian president has disclosed as photographs have emerged of the Wagner mercenary leader disguised in wigs.
“He is not on the territory of Belarus,” President Lukashenko told a news conference yesterday, adding that Prigozhin, 62, was in St Petersburg, Russia’s second city, or even Moscow.
The Belarusian leader, a close ally of President Putin, brokered the agreement that stopped the mercenaries’ march on Moscow and which allowed Prigozhin and his fighters to leave the country unharmed.
Lukashenko said Prigozhin was “absolutely free” and Putin would not “wipe him out” because the Russian president was not “malevolent and vindictive”. Photographs printed in a Russian newspaper taken on June 24 during a raid of Prigozhin’s property in St Petersburg showed a large collection of wigs and a picture featuring the severed heads of his enemies.
Investigators are also said to have found caches of assault weapons, ammunition and gold bars.
Images were posted on sites linked to the Russian state of the warlord wearing wigs in various ludicrous disguises, leading to speculation that they were doctored to hold the Wagner chief up to ridicule. It emerged yesterday that on the same day as the St Petersburg raid security forces had stormed Prigozhin’s media outlets, seizing computers and other equipment.
Lukashenko said last month that Prigozhin left Russia for Belarus on June 27. He told reporters, however, that the future location of Wagner’s permanent base had not been resolved.
“Whether they will be in Belarus or not, in what quantity, we will figure it out in the near future,” he said. “We are not building camps. We offered them several former military camps that were used in Soviet times, including near Osipovichi. But Wagner has a different vision for deployment. Of course I won’t tell you about this vision.”
The Kremlin has said it is “not following” Prigozhin’s movements, although on Wednesday Ukrainian military intelligence placed the Wagner leader in St Petersburg.
Flight-tracking data suggested that a private jet linked to the warlord left St Petersburg for Moscow, then headed towards southern Russia.
Jens Stoltenberg, the Nato secretary-general, said the alliance was keeping a close track of Prigozhin’s movements and Wagner’s troop deployments.
“We are monitoring closely where the Wagner soldiers are moving around and also where [Prigozhin] is moving,” Stoltenberg told reporters yesterday (Thursday). “We have seen some preparations for hosting large groups of Wagner soldiers in Belarus.
“So far we have not seen so many of them going to Belarus. And we have also seen Prigozhin moving around.”
Stoltenberg added that it was “too early to draw any final conclusions” about the consequences of recent events on Wagner forces.
Putin has moved quickly to restrict Prigozhin’s influence. No voice recordings or videos have been posted on the oligarch’s once prolific Telegram channels since June 26.
The former convict’s media holdings were shut down and Wagner signs were removed from the group’s headquarters. Wagner leaders are reported to have been arrested across the Middle East.
The mercenary force has continued its activities in Africa uninterrupted, however, and still appeared to be recruiting fighters.
Russian state television delivered a scathing attack on Putin’s former ally after his mutiny, during which his forces seized control of military headquarters in the southern city of Rostov and shot down several Russian fighter aircraft on their way to Moscow.
Meanwhile, photographs said to show the lavish interior of Putin’s armoured train, including a beauty salon and a medical centre where he receives anti-ageing treatment, have also been leaked to the Russian media.
The Dossier Centre, an investigative project founded by Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the opposition politician, published images of its apparent interior.
The centre includes devices for rejuvenating skin with high-frequency radio waves, low-voltage electrical treatment to enhance the production of collagen and cleansing solutions that help to clean the pores, along with micro suction.
The train includes a gym, sauna, bar and cinema. The centre claims that its latest upgrade has cost about pounds 60 million.
Reports have emerged in Washington that the United States is proposing to send cluster weapons to Ukraine, despite widespread calls for a worldwide ban on their use because of the harm they cause to civilians.
President Biden’s administration was expected to announce by the end of the week that it would send the munitions to help Ukrainian forces overcome Russian defences and in particular the minefields in its counteroffensive in the southeast of the country.
Cluster munitions can be delivered by rockets, missiles and aircraft, exploding in the air and spreading “bomblets” over a wide area. They are of particular use to foil minefields. By their nature, however, they are indiscriminate. Unexploded bomblets remain a hazard, especially for children, for months or years after the conflict.
The United Kingdom is one of more than 100 countries, including most EU states, to have signed up to a ban on their use and export. The list, however, includes neither the US, Russia nor the Ukraine. Both sides have used the weapons in the latest conflict.
Russian use of cluster munitions has caused hundreds of Ukrainian civilian casualties and damaged homes, hospitals and schools. Military leaders in Kyiv have openly asked to be supplied with the weapons.
The claims came as leaked images purported to show the interior of President Putin’s train.
The Times
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