Putin is working normally in the Kremlin, his spokesman Dmitry Peskov told state news agency RIA Novosti after Wagner’s forces said they had seized military facilities in southern Russia, AFP and Al Jazeera reported.

In this way, Peskov refutes rumors circulating in social networks, according to which Putin fled from Moscow due to the uprising of Wagner’s military.

Russia’s president accused Yevgeny Prigozhin of treason in a nationally televised speech on Saturday after his fighters crossed the border from Ukraine into Russia, entering the city of Rostov-on-Don.

Russian soldiers with machine guns were seen on the southwestern outskirts of Moscow, where they set up defensive positions, according to photos published by the Vedomosti newspaper, Reuters writes.

The photos also show armed police gathering at the site where the M4 motorway, which Wagner’s angry mercenaries are traveling on, leads to the Russian capital.