The White House says Russian President Vladimir Putin is increasingly turning to the Russian mercenary group Wagner for military support 10 months after he invaded Ukraine. According to the White House's most conservative estimate, released by National Security Spokesman John Kirby, there are now 50,000 Wagnerians deployed in Ukraine: 10,000 mercenaries and 40,000 convicts from Russian prisons, The Hill reports.
The owner of Wagner, Yevgeniy Prigozhyn, and other officials within the cmpany have been recruiting convicts from prisons to fight on the front lines because they are experiencing challenges in recruiting other Russians. Some of those prisoners have “serious medical conditions,” he added.
Additionally, Prigozhyn is spending more than $100 million per month to fund Wagner’s operations inside Ukraine, with his private army fighting alongside Russian forces.
“It’s pretty apparent to us that Wagner is emerging as a rival power centre to the Russian military and other Russian ministries,” Kirby said.
He also said North Korea completed an initial arms delivery to Wagner, and the company paid for the equipment. That delivery follows another one last month from North Korea that included infantry rockets and missiles sent to Russia for Wagner to use.
In the fighting in Bakhmut, Kirby said, about 1,000 Wagner soldiers died, 90 percent of them convicts.
The Ukrainian Intelligence Service believes that the armies of "Putin's cook" Prigozhyn and Chechen head Kadyrov were created to suppress potential uprisings in Russia.
According to Russian human rights activists, Ukrainians deported from Kherson and Mykolayiv regions and held in Russian colonies are also forcibly sent to the PMC.