Moscow: Russian mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin flew to Belarus from Russia on Tuesday after a mutiny that has dealt the biggest blow to President Vladimir Putin’s authority since he came to power more than 23 years ago.
Vladimir Putin initially vowed to crush the mutiny, comparing it to the war-time turmoil that ushered in the revolution of 1917 and then a civil war, but hours later a deal was clinched to allow Yevgeny Prigozhin and some of his fighters to go to Belarus.
Yevgeny Prigozhin, a 62-year-old former petty thief who rose to become Russia’s most powerful mercenary, was last seen in public when he left the southern Russian city of Rostov on Saturday, shaking hands and quipping that he had “cheered up” people.
Flightradar24 showed an Embraer Legacy 600 business jet appeared in Rostov region at 0232 GMT and began a descent at 0420 GMT near Minsk.
The identification codes of the aircraft matched those of a jet linked by the United States to Autolex Transport, which is linked to Prigozhin by the US Office of Foreign Assets Control that enforces sanctions.
“I see Prigozhin is already flying in on this plane,” President Alexander Lukashenko was quoted as saying by state news agency BELTA. “Yes, indeed, he is in Belarus today.”
Under a deal mediated by President Lukashenko on Saturday to halt a mutiny by Prigozhin’s mercenary fighters, Prigozhin was meant to move to Belarus.
In an address to the nation late on Monday, Vladimir Putin said the leaders of what he called the “armed mutiny” had betrayed Russia and the Russian people but thanked the army, law enforcement and special services for resisting the mutineers.
The 70-year-old Kremlin chief paid tribute to pilots killed during the mutiny and said he had ordered Russian forces to avoid further bloodshed, thanking those mercenaries in Wagner who stepped back from the brink of “armed rebellion” and bloodshed on Saturday.
Prigozhin’s “march for justice”, which he said was aimed at settling scores with Putin’s military top brass whom he cast as treasonous and corrupt, has raised the prospect of turmoil in Russia while undermining President Putin’s reputation as unchallenged leader.