​Belarusian President Oleksandr Lukashenko said on Friday that he had warned the mercenary leaders of the “Wagner” PMK Yevgeny Prigozhin and Dmytro Utkin about possible threats to their lives and insisted that the “Wagner” PMK fighters would remain in Belarus, writes The Guardian. Reuters.

Cartoon with Putin, Prigozhin and LukashenkaPhoto: Attila Husejnow/SOPA Images/Shutterstock Editorial/Profimedia

President Putin initially promised to crush Prigozhin’s uprising in June, comparing it to the wartime unrest that led to the 1917 revolution, but hours later struck a deal to allow Prigozhin and some of his fighters to leave for Belarus.

Prigozhin, – Lukashenko said on Friday, – would have twice rejected the fears expressed by the Belarusian leader regarding possible threats to the life of President Wagner.

Lukashenko claims that during the armed uprising he warned Prigozhin that he would “die” if he continued his march on Moscow, to which Prigozhin allegedly replied: “I will die with him.”

Then, according to Lukashenko, when Prigozhin and Utkin (who helped uncover Wagner’s mercenary group and was also a passenger on the plane that crashed) came to him, he warned them both: “Guys, be careful!”.

According to Reuters, it is not clear from the statements of the Belarusian leader Oleksandr Lukashenka, broadcast by the state agency BelTA, when these conversations took place.

Lukashenko, a long-time friend of Prigozhin but also a close ally of Russia, claimed that Putin had nothing to do with the plane crash.

“I know Putin: he is calculated, very calm, even late,” Lukashenko said. “I cannot imagine that Putin did it, that Putin is to blame. This is too hard and unprofessional work.”

Yevgeny Prigozhin is believed to have died after a plane carrying him from Moscow to St Petersburg crashed on Wednesday evening, carrying his right-hand man Dmytro Utkin and other Wagner group officials.

The Kremlin said on Friday that the West’s suggestion that the leader of Wagner’s mercenaries, Yevgeny Prigozhin, was killed on his orders was an “absolute lie”.

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