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Speculation Putin had Prigozhin killed 'absolute lie', says Kremlin
The Kremlin said on Friday that western suggestions that the Wagner group boss, Yevgeny Prigozhin, had been killed on its orders were an “absolute lie”, and it declined to definitively confirm his death, citing the need to wait for test results.
In a call with reporters, the Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, said: “There is now a great deal of speculation surrounding this plane crash and the tragic deaths of the plane’s passengers, including Yevgeny Prigozhin. Of course, in the west, all this speculation is presented from a well-known angle.
“All of this is an absolute lie, and here, when covering this issue, it is necessary to base yourself on facts. There are not many facts yet. They need to be established in the course of investigative actions.”
Peskov added that an investigation into the plane crash on Wednesday evening, in which Vladimir Putin has said that Prigozhin and his associates were killed according to preliminary information, is continuing. The Russian president had not met Prigozhin recently, Peskov added.
He also said it was impossible to say whether Putin would attend the funeral of Prigozhin and that the president had “a very full schedule”.
Peskov said the mercenary Wagner group had no formal legal existence. He said Wagner existed as a group that had made a “big contribution” to Russia’s military campaign in Ukraine, and he praised its fighters’ “heroism”.
Wagner mercenaries in June briefly attempted to march on Moscow in a mutiny aimed at ousting Prigozhin’s rivals in the defence establishment, a rebellion condemned by Putin as a treacherous “stab in the back”.
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The Chair of the Defence Select Committee has said Putin’s “back is against the wall” amid the death of a mercenary leader who led a mutiny against his regime.
Tobias Ellwood told Sky News he suspects the Russian leader will clamp down further on dissenting voices following the death of Wagner boss Yevgeny Prigozhin.
Ellwood said: “Putin is now exposed. This is his war and he has to show some form of success. He has to show he is actually taking advantage, if you like, of this situation. So, I expect something large to take place in Ukraine, or perhaps elsewhere, to distract.
“But, ultimately, he realises his back is against the wall. There are people circling, looking and recognising that he has been humiliated.
“I suspect he will clamp down further on dissenting voices and certainly he will be trying to reaffirm his leadership.
“This is a very dangerous situation, not just for Russia but for Europe as well.”
Jonathan Steele
Yevgeny Prigozhin, who has died aged 62 in a plane crash, was a multimillionaire militia commander who sparked the biggest crisis in the Russian president Vladimir Putin’s two decades in power.
Once a close friend and confidant of Putin, in June 2023 Prigozhin led an armed mutiny against Russia’s military leadership after severely criticising the invasion of Ukraine as being unnecessary and based on false premises.
In an obituary for Prigozhin, Jonathan Steele explains how the head of the Wagner mercenary army played a key role in the war in Ukraine:
Poland to investigate Russian 'involvement' in outbreak of legionnaires’ disease
Poland’s domestic security agency is investigating whether an outbreak of legionnaires’ disease that has killed seven people in the south of the country could be the result of intentional tampering with the water system, authorities said on Friday.
The bacteria that cause the illness have been found in 113 patients hospitalised in Rzeszów and the surrounding area, health authorities said. The seven people who have died were aged 64 to 95 and had other health conditions.
The deputy coordinator of special services, Stanislaw Żaryn, told PAP news agency that the internal security agency was investigating the outbreak to rule out some intentional activity.
Although he described this as routine, he said various scenarios needed to be checked. This included ruling out any possible involvement by Russia, he said.
The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, is expected to soon hold talks in person with Turkey’s president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the Kremlin said on Friday, as Ankara attempts to persuade Moscow to return to the Black Sea grain deal.
The deal, brokered by Turkey and the United Nations in July 2022 to help alleviate a global food crisis, allowed grain shipments from Ukraine’s Black Sea ports.
However, Moscow quit the deal last month, complaining that an accompanying agreement to facilitate Russia’s own grain and fertiliser exports was not being implemented.
Asked about Erdoğan’s invitation to Putin to visit Turkey to discuss the deal and other pressing issues, the Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, said: “There is an understanding that this meeting will take place soon.
“We usually synchronise announcements of such visits with our partner countries. We will announce shortly when and where it will take place. The meeting is being prepared, and is being prepared very thoroughly,” he said.
Earlier, Russia’s state RIA news agency reported that the Turkish foreign minister, Hakan Fidan, would visit Russia but it gave no details.
Speculation Putin had Prigozhin killed 'absolute lie', says Kremlin
The Kremlin said on Friday that western suggestions that the Wagner group boss, Yevgeny Prigozhin, had been killed on its orders were an “absolute lie”, and it declined to definitively confirm his death, citing the need to wait for test results.
In a call with reporters, the Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, said: “There is now a great deal of speculation surrounding this plane crash and the tragic deaths of the plane’s passengers, including Yevgeny Prigozhin. Of course, in the west, all this speculation is presented from a well-known angle.
“All of this is an absolute lie, and here, when covering this issue, it is necessary to base yourself on facts. There are not many facts yet. They need to be established in the course of investigative actions.”
Peskov added that an investigation into the plane crash on Wednesday evening, in which Vladimir Putin has said that Prigozhin and his associates were killed according to preliminary information, is continuing. The Russian president had not met Prigozhin recently, Peskov added.
He also said it was impossible to say whether Putin would attend the funeral of Prigozhin and that the president had “a very full schedule”.
Peskov said the mercenary Wagner group had no formal legal existence. He said Wagner existed as a group that had made a “big contribution” to Russia’s military campaign in Ukraine, and he praised its fighters’ “heroism”.
Wagner mercenaries in June briefly attempted to march on Moscow in a mutiny aimed at ousting Prigozhin’s rivals in the defence establishment, a rebellion condemned by Putin as a treacherous “stab in the back”.
Ukraine announced the dismissal of the head of its state emergency service on Friday after an internal inspection of the agency, which has had a prominent role since Russia’s invasion 18 months ago, Reuters reports.
“The government has decided to dismiss Serhiy Kruk from the post of head of the state emergency service,” the interior minister, Ihor Klymenko, wrote on the Telegram messaging app.
Klymenko gave no reasons for Kruk’s dismissal, but said it followed an internal inspection of the service, of which he provided few details. He said Kruk’s deputy, Volodymyr Demchuk, would serve as the agency’s acting head.
The service has been playing an important role trying to save lives, clear rubble and put out fires after frequent Russian air strikes and shelling.
More personnel decisions will follow the internal inspection, Klymenko said, adding that the service was working as usual.
Russia on Friday scolded the US president, Joe Biden, for expressing his lack of surprise that the Wagner group boss, Yevgeny Prigozhin, had been killed in a plane crash and cautioned that it was not appropriate for Washington to make such remarks, Reuters reports.
Biden on Wednesday said he was not surprised by reports about Prigozhin’s death, adding that not much happens in Russia that Vladimir Putin is not behind.
“I’m not surprised,” Biden said. “There is not much that happens in Russia that Putin is not behind, but I don’t know enough to know the answer.”
Russia’s deputy foreign minister, Sergei Ryabkov, said such remarks illustrated Washington’s disregard for diplomacy.
“Still, it is not for the US president, in my opinion, to talk about such tragic events of this kind,” Ryabkov was quoted by the state Tass news agency as saying.
Rishi Sunak has reaffirmed the UK defence ministry’s comments from Friday morning, saying intelligence suggested Prigozhin was “most likely” on the plane.
“We’re obviously monitoring the situation very closely, working with our allies to establish what happened,” the British prime minister told reporters.
The Russian embassy in Helsinki said it had been informed of the detention of a Russian citizen in Finland on Ukraine's request and was taking steps to offer consular assistance, Reuters reports, citing the Russian state news agency RIA.
Ukraine shoots down four Russian missiles and a drone, says defence ministry
On Thursday night, Ukraine shot down four Russian cruise missiles and a drone, the defence ministry said.
On Twitter, which is now known as X, the ministry said: “Russians attacked Ukraine with two Kalibr cruise missiles, two Kh-59 cruise missiles, and a Shahed UAV.
“All targets have been destroyed by Ukrainian air defence.”
Last night, russians attacked Ukraine with two Kalibr cruise missiles, two Kh-59 cruise missiles, and a Shahed UAV.
All targets have been destroyed by Ukrainian air defense.@KpsZSU
Russia’s foreign intelligence chief, Sergei Naryshkin, said the failure of Ukraine’s counteroffensive was “obvious”, Reuters reports, citing the Russian state news agency RIA.
UK says 'highly likely' Prigozhin is dead
The UK’s defence ministry has said there is not yet definitive proof the Wagner group mercenary boss, Yevgeny Prigozhin, was onboard a plane that crashed with no survivors earlier this week but it is “highly likely” he is dead, Reuters reports.
“The demise of Prigozhin would almost certainly have a deeply destabilising effect on the Wagner group,” the ministry said in a defence intelligence update posted on social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter.
(2/5) There is not yet definitive proof that Prigozhin was onboard and he is known to exercise exceptional security measures. However, it is highly likely that he is indeed dead.
— Ministry of Defence 🇬🇧 (@DefenceHQ) August 25, 2023US imposes sanctions on 13 people and entities over forced deportation and transfer of Ukrainian children
Reuters: the US state department on Thursday imposed sanctions on 13 people and entities it said were reportedly connected to the forced deportation and transfer of Ukraine’s children, as Washington ramps up pressure on Moscow over its invasion.
The US is also taking steps to impose visa restrictions on three Russia-installed purported authorities over their involvement in human rights abuses of Ukrainian minors, the state department said in a statement.
The sanctions coincided with Ukraine’s Independence Day.
“The United States will not stand by as Russia carries out these war crimes and crimes against humanity,” the US ambassador to the UN, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, told a UN security council meeting on Ukraine on Thursday.
Sian Cain
Danish film-maker and provocateur Lars von Trier has defended himself from backlash after writing a social media post that criticised Denmark’s donation of F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine.
“Russian lives matter also!” he wrote on Instagram on Tuesday after the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s visit to Denmark, where he and the Danish prime minister, Mette Frederiksen, inspected the F-16s to be delivered to his country.
Von Trier addressed his post to “Mr Zelensky and Mr Putin, and not least Mrs Frederiksen (who yesterday, like someone head over heels in love, posed in the cockpit of one of the scariest killing machines of our time, grinning from ear to ear)”.
Von Trier disabled comments on the post but it attracted the attention of Russian and Ukrainian media. Oleksiy Danilov, the head of Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council, shared the director’s post, writing on Twitter: “War is not a movie where actors play life and death. Behind every living Russian terrorist, there is a dead Ukrainian. The choice between the executioner and the victim becomes a tragedy when the artist chooses the side of the executioner”:
US to train F-16 pilots in October
The United States will begin flight training for Ukrainian pilots on F-16 fighter jets in October, the Pentagon has announced.
The training would begin after the pilots receive English-language training next month, a Pentagon spokesperson, Brig Gen Pat Ryder, said on Thursday. The flight training would take place at the Morris air national guard base in Tucson, Arizona, he added.
Several pilots and dozens of aircraft maintenance crew would take the training, Ryder added.
Last Sunday, Denmark and the Netherlands pledged to donate F-16s to Ukraine, fulfilling a longstanding wish by Ukraine that it says will help strengthen air defences and aid its counteroffensive against Russia’s 2022 invasion. Norway’s prime minister, Jonas Gahr Støre, on Thursday said his country would also give Ukraine F-16s:
42 Ukrainian drones launched over Crimea, says Russia
AFP: Russia’s air defence forces destroyed 42 Ukraine-launched drones over the Crimean peninsula and one missile over the Kaluga region early on Friday, the Russian defence ministry said.
The ministry said nine drones were destroyed by air defence forces while 33 were suppressed by electronic warfare and crashed over Crimea without reaching their targets. Russia annexed the peninsula from Ukraine in 2014.
Mikhail Razvozhayev, the Moscow-installed governor of the port city of Sevastopol in Crimea, said on the Telegram messaging app that a number of drones were destroyed over the Khersones promontory, on Sevastopol’s outskirts.
Earlier, the defence ministry said it had shot down a Ukraine-launched missile over the Kaluga region, which borders the Moscow region.
There were no immediate reports of casualties or damage from the attacks, which Russia blamed on Ukraine. Russian airports suspended flights for a few hours.
The number of drones launched was one of the largest in a surge of similar attacks.
Opening summary
Hello and welcome to our live coverage of the war in Ukraine with me, Helen Sullivan.
Our top stories this morning: Russia’s air defence forces destroyed 42 Ukraine-launched drones over the Crimean peninsula and one missile over the Kaluga region early on Friday, the Russian defence ministry said.
The ministry said nine drones were destroyed by air defence forces while 33 were suppressed by electronic warfare and crashed over Crimea without reaching their targets. Russia annexed the peninsula from Ukraine in 2014.
And the US will begin flight training for Ukrainian pilots on F-16 fighter jets in October, the Pentagon has announced.
Elsewhere:
Vladimir Putin has called Yevgeny Prigozhin a “talented businessman” with “a difficult fate”. In a meeting at the Kremlin, the Russian president addressed the crash of the Wagner chief’s business jet for the first time, offering condolences to the families of the 10 people onboard. He said that Prigozhin had returned to Russia from Africa on Wednesday and had met “some officials”, without specifying whom. “He was a man with a difficult fate. He made some serious mistakes in his life,” Putin said.
An explosion onboard probably brought down the plane presumed to be carrying the Wagner leader, a preliminary US intelligence assessment concluded. US and western officials said it determined that Prigozhin was “very likely” targeted and that the explosion falls in line with Putin’s “long history of trying to silence his critics”. Several of Prigozhin’s lieutenants were also presumed dead. Pentagon spokesperson Brig Gen Pat Ryder said he had no indication the plane was brought down by a surface-to-air missile. Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy has said Kyiv had nothing to do with the explosion. The presumed death follows a pattern of “unclarified” fatalities in Russia, Germany’s foreign minister said on Thursday.
Moscow’s Vnukovo and Domodedovo airports suspended flights early on Friday, Russia’s Tass news agency reported. Residents of the Russian regions of Tula and Kaluga earlier posted on social media about explosions they heard in the night, Russian online media outlet Baza reported. Flights were also briefly disrupted on Tuesday and Wednesday during Ukrainian drone attacks.
Ukrainian forces marked the country’s independence day with a naval raid into occupied Crimea, and Zelenskiy praised Ukrainians for the defiance and courage that has won them global support in the fight with Russia. The national holiday celebrates Ukraine’s independence from the former Soviet Union in 1991, but this year it also marks 18 months since Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion plunged the country into a war for survival.
Zelenskiy said early on Friday he spoke with the US president, Joe Biden. Zelenskiy said he thanked Biden for his Ukraine Independence Day greetings and support in the conflict with Russia. “Together, we prove that freedom and independence are worth fighting for,” he said in a statement.
Russia will return to the Black Sea grain deal only if the west fulfils its “obligations to Moscow”, Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, told the UN secretary general, António Guterres.
Russia has extended the detention of the Wall Street Journal correspondent Evan Gershkovich by three months. He was the first journalist arrested by Russian authorities on allegations of spying since the cold war.
