Saturday 29 July 2023

Ukraine Notes:

Wagner

Kilner, James (7/29/23) The Telegraph

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2023/07/29/wagner-group-mercenaries-prigozhin-poland-belarus/

• 16,000 immigrants mainly from the Middle East and South Asia had already tried to cross the border from Belarus to Poland this year.
• Wagner training camp in Belarus is near Brest in southern Belarus to train Belarusian special forcer.
• Poland has relocated 1,000 soldiers to its border.
• Wagner Telegram channels have reported 10,000 Wagner mercenaries may relocate to Belarus.
• “In 2021, Belarus flew thousands of migrants to Minsk before moving them to the border in Poland.
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• Last year, Wagner fighters in Libya helped to launch boats full of migrants toward Italy.”
• Wagner Telegram has released a recording of Prigozhin praising the coup in Niger.
• Wagner has extensive contacts in Mali which neighbors Niger, where government is fighting the Islamic insurgency.

Almond, Mark (7/28/23) The Telegraph.

• Africa  “this conference is part of a revolution in African geopolitics that represents one of the biggest threats to European and American geostrategic interests in the modern era. “
• “…Sub-Saharan Africa has become an arena of Russian intervention against Western allies and interests. To take one recent example, this week’s military coup in the Sahel by army officers in Niger toppled a pro-Western elected president who had hosted the U.S. Secretary of State, Antony Blinken just months ago. As in neighboring Mali, the military junta’s supporters appear openly sympathetic to Russia.”
• Prigozhin boasted about the coup against “colonists.”
• (Note: Questions whether US will ignore orders to get out, or remain in the region to counter Wagner).
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