Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of the Russian mercenary group Wagner, said that the Ukrainian counteroffensive could turn into a “tragedy” for Russia, saying that his fighters have no ammunition, reports AFP.

“We (Wagner) have only 10-15 percent of the ammunition we need,” said Wagner’s boss in an interview with pro-Kremlin military correspondent Semyon Pegov.

Prigozhin, who blamed the Russian military for a lack of ammunition, said he expected a counteroffensive from Ukraine in mid-May. “This counteroffensive could become a tragedy for our country,” he warned.

For months, Wagner led the Russian assault on Bakhmut, an eastern Ukrainian city at the epicenter of hostilities.

Prigozhin is an ally of President Vladimir Putin, but as head of a private military group he has been embroiled in a power struggle with Russia’s defense ministry.

As such, Prigozhin is in open conflict with the Russian military hierarchy, whom he accuses of deliberately not supplying ammunition to his men and has publicly attacked Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu on several occasions.

Ukraine said this week that preparations for a counteroffensive are nearing completion.

Ukraine’s reservations to Russia

On Sunday, the governor of Russia’s Bryansk region, which borders Ukraine, announced that Ukrainian bombing of a Russian village resulted in four deaths and two injuries.

According to the authorities of the Russian-annexed peninsula, a day earlier a drone attack caused a fire at an oil depot in Sevastopol, the port of the Russian Black Sea Fleet in Crimea.

The spokeswoman of the Southern Operational Command of Ukraine, Nataliya Humenyuk, warned Russia that the fire at the PMM warehouse of the Russian fleet in occupied Sevastopol is preparation for active actions of the Ukrainian army.

Humenyuk noted that undermining Russian logistics is one of the elements of preparation for active actions of the Armed Forces.

“This work is preparatory to the broad, large-scale offensive that everyone is waiting for,” noted Nataliya Humenyuk.

Prigozhin also threatens Russia to withdraw from Bakhmut

Yevgeny Prigozhin, the founder of Wagner’s group, which often claimed unverifiable successes, said his troops had advanced 100 to 150 meters deep into Bakhmut, leaving just under 3 square kilometers of the city in Ukrainian hands.

But he said he lost 94 soldiers.

“There would be five times less of them if we had more ammunition,” Prigozhin said on Saturday evening in the Telegram channel of his press service.

Also, in a nearly 90-minute video interview with Russian military blogger Semyon Pegov published on Saturday, Prigozhin threatened to withdraw troops from Bakhmut, saying he only had a few days’ worth of ammunition left.

“If the shortage of ammunition is not filled, then … most likely, we will have to withdraw part of the units,” Prigozhin said, referring to a letter sent to Russian Defense Minister Sergei Soyg, which specified the deadline. from April 28

Prigozhin often stated that the regular armed forces did not provide his men with the necessary ammunition, and sometimes accused the command of treason.

“We must stop deceiving the population and tell them that everything is fine,” Prigozhin said in an interview.