Kremlin calls accusations it killed Wagner boss Prigozhin an ‘absolute lie’

Reuters :
The Kremlin said that Western suggestions that Wagner mercenary boss Yevgeny Prigozhin had been killed on its orders in a plane crash were an “absolute lie” while declining to definitively confirm his death, citing the need to wait for test results.

Russia’s aviation authority has said Prigozhin was on board the downed private jet, and President Vladimir Putin on Thursday sent his condolences to Prigozhin’s family, breaking his silence after the plane went down on Wednesday with no survivors two months after Prigozhin led a mutiny against army chiefs.

Putin cited “preliminary information” as indicating that Prigozhin and his top associates in the Wagner mercenary group had all been killed and, while praising Prigozhin, said he had also made some “serious mistakes.”

Western politicians and commentators have suggested, without evidence, that Putin ordered Prigozhin killed to punish him for launching a failed June 23-34 mutiny against the army’s top brass which also represented the biggest challenge to Putin’s own rule since he came to power in 1999.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the accusation and many others like it were false.

“There is now a great deal of speculation surrounding this plane crash and the tragic deaths of the plane’s passengers, including Yevgeny Prigozhin. Of course, in the West, all this speculation is presented from a well-known angle,” Peskov told reporters.