Russian businessman Yevgeny Prigozhin, who leads the Wagner mercenary group, mentioned he plans to run for president within the 2024 elections.
“I’m making a political coming out. Looking at everything around me, I’ve got political ambitions. So I decided to run for president in 2024. For President of Ukraine,” Prigozhin mentioned in a video posted on Telegram.
Prigozhin mentioned he expects to compete for this put up with former President Petro Poroshenko and incumbent Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
“If I win the presidential elections of Ukraine, then everything will be fine, guys; the shells will not be needed,” he mentioned.
Asked why he complains about poor ammunition provides from the Russian protection business and doesn’t purchase it himself, Prigozhin mentioned if he buys every part together with his personal cash, it is going to be “state management, not a business.”
According to him, the Wagner group wants some 10,000 tons of ammunition, price roughly $1 billion, each month.
On human losses, Prigozhin mentioned, “fighters die at war in any case; the war is so invented that one army kills another.”
He refuted allegations that he’s in cahoots with the Ukrainian authorities and “for money and lifting of sanction” will depart the battle zone “at the right moment.”
“I am not going anywhere. The question is — who took the money when we ‘made a gesture of goodwill’ and surrendered Kherson, Kharkiv region, and many other (territories)?” he questioned, hinting on the Russian navy chiefs.
In a separate assertion, Prigozhin introduced that Wagner recruitment facilities have opened in 42 Russian cities.
“New fighters are coming there who will go side by side with us to defend their country and family. To make our common future and protect the memory of the past. We will go forward despite the colossal resistance of Ukraine’s armed forces. Despite the sticks in the wheels stuck in ours at every move, we will overcome this together,” Prigozhin mentioned.
Prigozhin is at odds with the Russian navy chiefs, together with Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and head of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov.
The head of the Wagner group many instances publicly doubted the competence of the Russian Defense Ministry and its high officers, voiced his suspicions of the ministry’s “jealousy” for Wagner’s “successes,” and in reference to that — of deliberately inflicting obstacles to the group, together with reducing provides of ammunition.
Source: www.dailysabah.com
