Since 2018, around 1,000 Wagner fighters have resided in the African country where – obviously with extreme violence – they protect the government of Faustin-Archange Touadéra from the insurgents and search for gold. Reportedly, much of Wagner’s operations in Ukraine were financed by mining revenues from African countries. By calling Wagner out of all these highly profitable enterprises, Putin would have slaughtered the golden goose. In addition, the Russian Defense Ministry probably does not have enough capabilities to replace Wagner fighters, after all, every soldier is needed on the Ukrainian front.
According to Bloomberg’s other source, Putin is likely to keep Wagner in charge of operations in other African countries that “pay for themselves,” while focusing on those countries directly dependent on Moscow. ‘Paying for themselves’ are, for example, West African Mali and Burkina Faso, where the club mines gold and lithium, among other things, and North African Libya, where the group has oil interests (just like in Syria, ed.).
Sudan
Sudan, on the other hand, is a completely different story. According to Bloomberg’s source, that land, where Wagner operates several gold mines, is a critical logistics corridor “connecting Wagner’s operations.” Sudan is Putin’s “next big problem” on the agenda, according to Bloomberg. And that makes sense now that Putin is disciplining Yevgeny Prigozhin’s Wagner empire and further incorporating it into the state.
Collision course
The Kremlin and the Wagner Group have traditionally worked closely together in Africa: Wagner exploits and generates income, while Russia expands its sphere of political influence on the continent (mainly at the expense of the unpopular former colonizer France, ed.). This is not the case in Sudan, where the Russian state and the mercenaries are increasingly on a collision course. And especially since the Sudanese government army and Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo’s RSF militias have been fighting to the death since April.
The Kremlin maintains excellent relations with the Sudanese government of General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, in February the Sudanese government granted the Russians permission to build a naval base in the port of Port Sudan on the Red Sea. The base will house 300 Russian servicemen, including four warships. At the same time, the Wagner mercenaries have long been working closely with the Sudanese militias of the Rapid Support Force. In areas controlled by the militia, the Wagner Group mines for gold, in return the Wagner Group supplies the militias with weapons. Which has been fighting against the Sudanese government since April.