Wagner Group founder Yevgeny Prigozhin claimed on June 23, 2023, that Russian troops were retreating in the Zaporizhzhia and Kherson directions, in a 30-minute video released by his press service, Suspilne reported.
“Pushing the Russian army back”
Prigozhin said Ukrainian forces were pushing back the Russian army and that Russia’s military leadership had no control and no reserves. He accused the Defence Ministry of deceiving President Vladimir Putin about successes on the battlefield, dismissing claims of 60 destroyed Leopard tanks and 3,000 Ukrainian soldiers killed as “total nonsense.”
Why the war started
Most of the video was an attack on the Defence Ministry and Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu. Prigozhin said the full-scale invasion of February 2022 was launched for other reasons than those officially given. “The war was needed so that a bunch of scum could celebrate and show off,” he said, adding that it was also needed “so that Shoigu could become a marshal.”
“The Armed Forces of Ukraine were not going to attack Russia with the NATO bloc,” Prigozhin said, according to WION, accusing the ministry of deceiving the public and the president about a supposed Ukrainian plan to attack Russia. He said the war was not about the “demilitarisation” or “denazification” of Ukraine.
Donbas “looted”
Prigozhin also claimed that from 2014 to 2022 the whole of Donbas was looted by various people, some from the Russian presidential administration and some from the FSB. “There was massive theft in the Donbas, but they wanted more,” he said.
His claims about the front line contradicted Putin’s recent assertions that Ukraine was suffering “catastrophic” losses in its counteroffensive. The statements could not be independently verified.
Sources
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