Where did this Wagner come from?

Yevgeny Prigojin, the founder of the Russian mercenary company Wagner, challenged Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu yesterday, causing all eyes to turn towards this company.

Prigojin accused the Russian army of attacking Wagner and threatened to retaliate.

Faced with this situation, the Federal Security Service (FSB) opened a criminal case on the charge of “armed riots”.

In a statement from the Russian Defense Ministry, the allegations that Wagner attacked their camps were denied.

HIGH SALARY

The Russian mercenary company Wagner, which was founded in 2014 and became increasingly active in 2015-2016, was set up to help Russian-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine.

The name of the Russian Wagner group, which played a pivotal role in the Libyan conflicts, was first heard in the Syrian Civil War.

Wagner, who fought alongside regime forces, also supported separatists in Ukraine.

Wagner joined fighting alongside President Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela in 2019.

Detected to date in Sudan, Syria, Libya and the African continent, the operations of the Wagner mercenaries quickly spread beyond Eastern Europe.

It was the high salary and the promise of adventure that made the group attractive.

WHO FUNDS?

Most of those who joined Wagner before the war in the Ukraine lived in small towns where their chances of finding well-paying jobs were limited.

Wagner pays his employees around $1,500 per month. When they go to the front, this fee goes up to 2 thousand dollars.

Russia’s military intelligence agency, GRU, allegedly secretly funds and monitors the Wagner Group.

Wagner’s boss, who has about 25,000 employees, is known as “Putin’s cook” in Russia.

‘PUTIN’S COOK’

Wagner founder Yevgeniy Prigojin, close to Russian President Vladimir Putin, was known as “Putin’s cook” because of the state tenders he received in the field of food service.

Yevgeny Prigojin is seen to Putin’s left at a dinner in Moscow in November 2011

A Wagner Center opened in St. Petersburg in October last year. The center was a state-of-the-art office complex that organized educational and training activities for school-age children and youth “in the fields of information technology, media, and basic military training with the aim of increasing Russia’s combat capability.”

Official Russian news agencies, which until recently made no mention of Wagner, reported on the group several times a day and covered the prisoner conscription.

The Russian state channel NTV carried a story about the Wagner Group, describing it as “the most experienced army in the world.”

Russian police were deployed this morning in front of the Wagner Center in Saint Petersburg.