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How Russia’s Wagner Group Is Expanding in Africa


Mercenaries are enjoying a resurgence in Africa, hired to fight in some of the continent’s most intractable conflicts. Perhaps the most famous outfit is the Wagner Group, a sophisticated network combining military forces with commercial and strategic interests that is now the vanguard of Russia’s expansionist ambitions in Africa.

Wagner warriors have been active in the wars in Mali, Central African Republic, Mozambican and Libya. They allied themselves with good leaders and militia commanders, who could pay for their services in cash or with lucrative mining concessions for precious minerals such as gold, diamonds and uranium. Wagner’s army had to face frequent accusations torture, killing of civilians and other ill-treatment.

But Wagner is more than a simple gold scheme. Operating through a series of shell companies, it has become a term for a range of Kremlin-backed operations in more than a dozen African countries. Wagner interfered in politics, supported autocrats and staged digital propaganda campaign. It donates food to the poor and action movie production set in Africa. It even has hold a beauty contest.

The Kremlin denies any association with Wagner. But American and Europe officials, as well as most experts, say it is an unofficial tool of Russian power – a cheap and undeniable way for President Vladimir V. Putin to expand his reach, bolster his arsenal of wars against Western sanctions and expand his influence on a continent where it remains sympathy for Russia quite tall.

“It is a Russian power game,” said Pauline Bax, deputy Africa director at the International Crisis Group. “Through Wagner, it wanted to see how far it could spread its influence in Africa. I think the results have surprised a lot of people.”

Here’s a look at how Wagner has spread across Africa and why its activities are increasingly important to Mr. Putin.

Wagner rose to prominence during Putin’s first incursion into Ukraine in 2014, when the country’s mercenaries fought alongside pro-Russian separatists in the Donbas region. Its commander is Dmitry Utkin, a retired Russian Special Forces commander said to be fascinated by Nazi history and culture.

The group’s name, and Mr. Utkin’s military call sign, were taken from the composer Richard Wagner, Hitler’s favorite. Some of the group’s warriors share that ideology: Ancient Nordic symbols favored by white extremists have been photographed on the Wagner device in Africa and the Middle East.

Wagner expanded into Syria in 2015, tasked with supporting President Bashar al-Assad and seizing oil and gas fields, US officials said. In 2016, Putin presented Utkin with military honors during a party in the Kremlin. A year later, the United States imposed sanctions against Mr. Utkin for his activities with Wagner.

The group moved to Africa in 2017 under the explicit guidance of Yevgeny V. Prigozhina Russian oligarch known as “Putin’s chef.”

Like Mr. Putin, Mr. Prigozhin hails from St.Petersburg, where he ran a hot dog stand before setting up a catering business that thrived on lucrative Kremlin deals. USA prosecuted him in 2018 about allegations that he funded a Russian troll factory that allegedly interfered in the 2016 presidential election.

In Africa, Wagner began advising dictators, conducting disinformation campaigns on social media and deploying fake election monitoring groups, according to Western officials, experts and United Nations investigators. Companies affiliated with Mr. Prigozhin operate gold and diamond mines.

Mr. Prigozhin denies any connection to Wagner, and has even questioned the existence of the group. “The Wagner legend is just a legend,” he said in a written answer to the question.

According to experts, he may be technically correct: No longer a single company, Wagner has become the brand name for an informal Russian network that stretches across the continent.

Since 2016 US. has imposed at least seven sets of sanctions against Mr. Prigozhin, his companies and his associates, sing out his yacht and three private jets. Facebook and Twitter yes eliminate hundreds of fake accounts run by his associates. Russian investigative news agencies have documents his close relationship with Putin and the Russian Defense Ministry.

That record sets Prigozhin quite apart from other Russian oligarchs who made a fortune by privatizing the Russian state in the 1990s, experts say.

“He is not an independent businessman,” said Samuel Ramani of the United Nations Institute of Royal Services, a London-based nonprofit and the author of an upcoming book on Russia in Europe. Fly. “His business interests are closely tied to what Wagner does, and he is cut short as a middleman in deals between African leaders and the Kremlin.”

One of Wagner’s first voyages across the continent was a disaster.

In 2019, it deployed about 160 fighter jets to the gas-rich, Muslim-majority Cabo Delgado region, in northern Mozambique. But within weeks, rebels with a local branch of the Islamic State were killed at least seven Wagner, US officials said. A few months later, the Russians withdrew.

Wagner seems to have learned from those mistakes in the Central African Republic, where they came in 2018 to defend the besieged president, Faustin-Archange Touadéra. After training local security forces, it helped the army repel a major Islamist attack in early 2021.

But those modest benefits have come at a heavy price: discovered that Wagner’s forces were killing civilians, looting homes and shooting worshipers at a mosque. Critics note that the activity focuses on areas where Mr. Prigozhin’s companies are mining diamonds.

In Libya, Wagner fighters supported a failed attack on the capital Tripoli in 2019 by Khalifa Hifter, a power-hungry commander. Thousands of Wagner fighters are still stationed at four bases across Libya, most of them near the country’s oil fieldsWestern officials and analysts say.

In Sudan, Wagner applied for a gold mining franchise and tried unsuccessfully to save the country’s autocratic leader, President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, who was ousted in April 2019.

Currently Wagner’s main partner in Sudan is General Mohamed Hamdan, a powerful paramilitary commander who fly to Moscow on the eve of the war in Ukraine to meet with senior Russian officials.

Perhaps Wagner’s most controversial operation was in Mali, where Wagner’s forces arrived in December 2021 amid the The United States Department of State called “A wide range of misinformation is targeted to conceal its appearance and activities.” Its fighters quickly joined the fight against the Muslim insurgency.

But by mid-April, Wagner had been involved in more than a dozen incidents that left nearly 500 people dead, according to researchers and UN reports.

In addition to providing rental guns, Russia has attempted to shape the politics of at least a dozen African countries with social media and political influence campaigns.

Last year the US Treasury Department determined what it calls a “front company for Prigozhin’s influence activities in Africa” ​​that it says has funded rogue surveillance missions in Zimbabwe, Madagascar, Democratic Republic of Congo, South Africa and Mozambique.

In 2019, two Russians working for Prigozhin met the son of the former Libyan dictator, Muammar el-Qaddafi, and were sent to prison. A company associated with the latter Prigozhin make a movie about the russian challenge, portraying their captors as violent sadists. Detainees has been released in December 2020.

“The Russians do not abandon them!” said Mr. Prigozhin’s company, Concord, in a statement.

Since October 2019, Facebook has Turn off More than 300 fake Facebook and Instagram accounts linked to Mr Prigozhin, which they say have targeted dozens of African countries.

Wagner also fights through popular culture. In the Central African Republic, the companies of Mr. Prigozhin sponsor a beauty contestsponsors a radio station, and last year released a film, “Touriste,” praising Wagner’s mercenary actions in that country.

In December, another movie sponsored by Prigozhin aired on Russian TV, this time about Wagner’s bloody adventures in Mozambique. Wagner maintains a discreet presence in that country: after its fighters withdrew in 2020, they left behind a small cyberwar cell rented by the Mozambican government, a Western security official said. in Africa said, citing European intelligence reports.

Mr. Putin signaled his ambitions for Russia in Africa at the African leaders summit in Sochi in 2019, when he described the continent as the place of “Important Opportunity” for the Kremlin.

That expansion is part of Mr. Putin’s broader desire to re-establish Russia as a great power, analysts say, in part turning him against China. Turkey, the United Arab Emirates and other nations have been vying for places in Africa as Western influence wanes. .

Some African leaders are drawn to Moscow by arms: Russia has become the largest supplier of weapons in Africa. But Mr. Putin is also tapping into deep historical and political currents.

Many African countries have reluctant to join the condemnation of the West about Russia’s attack on Ukraine – some sympathize with the lingering cold war, but many others out of frustration with what they see as the West’s disdain for Africa.

In West Africa, Russia is exploiting the growing anti-French sentiment in countries like Mali, where the arrival of Wagner agents led to the departure of French soldiers and diplomats this year. A military coup in Burkina Faso was greeted by protesters waving Russian flags. And in Cameroon, officials signed a defense agreement with Russia in April which some see as a precursor to the Wagner deployment.

Second Russia-Africa Summit Scheduled for november. This time, the proposed location is the city of St.Petersburg, Mr. Putin’s hometown – which is also the base of Mr. Prigozhin’s activities.

Elian Peltier Reporting contributions from Dakar, Senegal.





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