Russia-Ukraine War
Image Defense Minister Sergei K. Shoigu, seated, in a photo released by his ministry on Monday. Credit... Russian Defense Ministry, via Reuters
Russia sought on Monday to project a return to normal after a weekend rebellion that shook President Vladimir V. Putin’s authority, but the Kremlin’s efforts to move on were undermined by a host of swirling questions about the fallout from the armed uprising in which mutinous mercenaries got to within 125 miles of Moscow.
The whereabouts of Yevgeny V. Prigozhin, the leader of the Wagner paramilitary group whose forces mounted the brief mutiny, were still unknown on Monday. The Kremlin said Saturday that Mr. Prigozhin would receive exile in Belarus in exchange for calling off his forces’ march to Moscow, the Russian capital, but it is not known exactly what deal Mr. Prigozhin struck, whether it still holds or whether the criminal investigation into him has been dropped as the Kremlin initially indicated.
Mr. Putin, too, is keeping a low profile. He has not been seen publicly since a five-minute speech on Saturday in which he declared Mr. Prigozhin a traitor and promised to quash the mutiny.
In the Kremlin’s telling, the Russian leader was hard at work, according to statements released by the government on Monday. Mr. Putin, the Kremlin said, had held several phone calls with allies including the emir of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani, and President Ebrahim Raisi of Iran. Both leaders expressed support for the Russian leadership, according to the statements. Russia released a video of Defense Minister Sergei K. Shoigu for the first time since the short-lived uprising, appearing to signal that he remained in his post despite scathing criticism by Mr. Prigozhin for the conduct of the war in Ukraine. The Russian Defense Ministry said Mr. Shoigu had traveled to a command post involved in the war, but did not specify when or where the visit occurred, and some Russian military bloggers said the video had been filmed before the uprising. In a meeting with senior officials televised on Monday, Prime Minister Mikhail V. Mishustin acknowledged that “an attempt was made to destabilize the internal situation in Russia,” but insisted that members of the government continued working as usual. “Under the leadership of the president, they acted clearly, harmoniously, and maintained a stable situation at all levels,” Mr. Mishustin said. The Russian authorities also sought to show that security had been restored. Deputy Prime Minister Andrei Belousov said that the major M-4 highway — which was damaged over the weekend as Russian forces tried to slow the advance of Wagner troops toward Moscow — had been repaired and that all air and railway communications had been restored. Moscow’s mayor on Monday morning also ended the restrictions that had been put in place in the city as a result of the uprising and announced that school graduation ceremonies would take place this weekend. The rebellion led by Mr. Prigozhin, in which fighters from his Wagner private military company captured a key Russian military installation in the south and moved nearly halfway toward Moscow, has posed the biggest threat to Mr. Putin’s rule in more than two decades. Mr. Prigozhin, once a close ally and confidant of Mr. Putin, had for months publicly criticized Mr. Shoigu and other military leaders, accusing them of mismanaging the war in Ukraine and starving his troops of ammunition. Russia’s military has relied on Wagner, a force with thousands of highly skilled troops, to engage Ukraine’s military in some of the bloodiest battles since Russia invaded in February 2022. The rebellion, which barely lasted 24 hours, ended on Saturday, when the leader of Belarus, a close ally of Mr. Putin, offered Mr. Prigozhin exile in his country. Mr. Putin’s government said it had dropped the charges against Mr. Prigozhin and said the Wagner troops could enlist in the military and would not face discipline. But on Monday, several Russian news outlets controlled by or affiliated with the Kremlin reported that a criminal case against Mr. Prigozhin for his role in the uprising remained open.
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Source: The New York Times
