The Wagner rebellion's leaders will be brought to justice, Russian President Vladimir Putin promised in a televised speech. This was Putin's first public statement since the mutiny by the mercenary squad on June 24 ended in a tense truce.
In a dramatic speech he gave a few days ago, while the apparent uprising was still going on, Putin branded the acts of the Wagner's head a "stab in the back" and vowed to put an end to what he termed a "rebellion." His comments on Monday were his first since then.
Yevgeny Prigozhin, the commander of the Wagner, on Saturday, ordered his rapidly advancing forces to halt down and return to base in exchange for the alleged dropping of criminal proceedings against him in exchange for his agreement to live in exile in Belarus, a country nearby.
Putin, though, appeared to take aim at Wagner's head in his Monday speech as he condemned the rebel leaders' "criminal activity which aims at weakening the country" and vowed to bring the "organizers of this rebellion to justice."
“This is criminal activity, which is aimed at weakening the country,” Putin said. “This was a colossal threat.”
Putin’s remarks appear to run counter to earlier reports that criminal charges against Prigozhin would be dropped.
The Russian leader added that “any attempts to stir unrest are doomed to fail,” while claiming that the rebellion would have been thwarted before it reached Moscow as the Kremlin was ready and had taken all “necessary decisions to neutralize the threat.”
Putin said that the majority of the Wagner warriors were patriots who "avoided additional bloodshed by turning back."
Putin said that he would permit Wagner combatants to migrate to Belarus, enter into agreements with the Defense Ministry, or even return to their families if they so desired.
Before Putin's eagerly anticipated speech, there was debate over whether the Kremlin and Wagner truce would hold. The exiled leader of the mercenary group said in a statement that he wasn't trying to topple Putin, but Western officials questioned whether there was still another act in the dramatic saga to come.
