Law, Power, and Justice

News Notes, Friday 7 July 2023

Prigozhin, Newsweek

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/why-prigozhin-is-still-a-free-man/ar-AA1dyeY0

• The Institute for the Study of War (ISW) released an analysis of why Prigozhin was reported to be in Russia not Belarus.
• Lukashenko stated that Wagner fighters were still in camps near Bakhmut.  Referring to Prigozhin, he said: “…he’s not in Belarus.”
• Dmitry Peskov, Kremlin spokesman, said that the Russian government had neither the “ability” nor the “desire” to follow Prigozhin’s movements.
• The ISW argues that Prigozhin is either “protected by some security guarantees” or that the Kremlin thinks undermining his reputation is more important than killing him.
• Kyiv has said that Russia intends to assassinate Prigozhin and that Ukrainian intelligence knew about the plans for the mutiny and a plan by the FSB to assassinate Prigozhin.
• The ISW analysis concludes that Putin probably “decided that he cannot directly eliminate Prigozhin without making him a martyr for causes concerning the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) mishandling of the invasion.”
• In addition, mobilizing forces to eliminate Prigozhin risks those troops turning “their arms against the regime itself.”
• Mikhail Khodorkovsky, a self-exiled former Russian tycoon, told Newsweek that not punishing anyone for the mutiny made the risk for another mutiny “more likely.”  Khodorkovsky headed the energy company Yukos before he spent ten years in prison in Russia until 2013 for what critics say were politically motivated charges.
• “You start punishing people, then you could suddenly find out that half of the active army are siding with Prigozhin and then by that, you could actually promote a greater mutiny and much greater clash,” he added.

Putin Fled Moscow, Newsweek, (7/5/23)

• The self-exiled tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky told Newsweek that he had been monitoring Putin’s movements during the failed coup.  Putin, according to a contact of Khodorkovsky’s, left Moscow, most likely to his house in Valdai, some 250 miles away
• K said that a plane “which is only used by Putin” left Moscow on June 24 and headed toward Russia’s northwest.
• K also reported that a lot of heads of departments left Moscow as well.