Prigozhin is said to have offered to betray Russian troops

Is the situation in Bakhmut turning in favor of Ukraine after all? Recently, the head of the Russian Wagner mercenary group, Yevgeny Prigozhin, announced that he controlled more than 80 percent of the embattled city. But for the past few days, the Ukrainian armed forces have been increasingly successful in pushing back the Russian military. Kiev Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Malijar wrote on Telegram on Sunday: “Today our units have taken more than ten enemy positions on the northern and southern outskirts of Bakhmut.” How much propaganda is behind the success story is unclear, but how important this place has become is shown by irritating statements by Wagner boss Prigoshin.

At the beginning of the year he is said to have been ready to reveal the positions of Russian positions to the Ukrainians if they in turn withdrew from Bakhmut. This is reported by the “Washington Post” with reference to the leaked documents. It also shows how the Ukrainians reacted to this offer: According to the “Washington Post”, they declined.

All-out espionage by the Americans

The information comes from Discord Leaks documents that became public in the spring. 21-year-old Jack Teixeira, IT worker with the US National Guard, had uploaded countless secret service documents to the gaming platform Discord. It mainly reads how the United States assesses the war in Ukraine. It is disputed how critical and sensitive the data actually is. However, they show how extensively the Americans spied on Russian troops and the Wagner group.

According to the Washington Post, “Prigozhin sent the offer through his contacts with the Ukrainian Military Intelligence Service (HUR), with whom he maintained secret communications throughout the war.” According to the newspaper, two Ukrainians have confirmed that Prigozhin spoke to HUR more often. Allegedly, the Wagner boss even made his Bachmut offer more than once, but the Ukrainian side “does not trust him and believes his proposal is a malicious deception,” according to the “Post”. The fear is shared in the US capital.

Prigozhin threatened to withdraw from Bakhmut

Yevgeny Prigozhin plays his own game in the Ukraine war. On the one hand he enjoys the trust of Kremlin boss Vladimir Putin, or at least enjoyed it for a long time, on the other hand he is in a public dispute with the Russian Ministry of Defense. He accuses the Moscow military leadership of not supporting him and his mercenaries enough. In several videos, he complained about the lack of willingness to supply sufficient ammunition. Recently he even threatened to withdraw his troops completely from Bakhmut. But he changed his mind after the Defense Department signaled it would honor his request.

The battle in the “meat grinder” Bachmut is the longest and bloodiest in the war so far. Both Russia and Ukraine are trying to inflict extremely high casualties on their respective opponents in order to weaken them. Until recently, the Wagner group had bought prisoners from Russian prisons, who, as “disposable soldiers,” were burned en masse at the front. The town, which once had 70,000 inhabitants, now resembles a desert of rubble. Bakhmut is important in terms of military strategy, but not nearly as decisive as it is as a symbol of the Ukrainian spirit of resistance.

Sarcastic reaction from the Wagner boss

The Washington Post also reported that Prigozhin met with representatives of the Ukrainian military intelligence service in an African country. Prigozhin himself reacted sarcastically to the report on Sunday evening. He could confirm the meeting with the head of the Ukrainian military intelligence service, Kyrylo Budanov, in Africa. “We are in Africa with Budanov so far,” he said on his Telegram channel – which is obviously not true. He had recently reported several times from Bachmut.

Sources: DPA, AFP, “”