Head of the Wagner paramilitary group Yevgeny Prigozhin stated on Saturday that he intends to run for president of Ukraine in 2024.
“I’m making a political coming out. Looking at everything around me, I’ve got political ambitions. I decided to run for president in 2024. For President of Ukraine,” Prigozhin stated in a video, posted on Telegram.
Prigozhin stated he expects to compete for this publish 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 stated.
Asked why he complains about poor provides of ammunition from the Russian protection trade and doesn’t purchase it himself, Prigozhin stated if he buys every part along with his personal cash, it will likely be “state management, not business.”
According to him, the Wagner group wants some 10,000 tons of ammunition, value roughly $1 billion, each month.
On human losses, Prigozhin stated “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 go away 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 army chiefs.
In a separate assertion, Prigozhin introduced that Wagner recruitment facilities have opened in 42 Russian cities.
“There are new fighters coming there who will go side by side with us to defend their country and their family. To make our common future and protect the memory of the past. Despite the colossal resistance of Ukraine‘s armed forces, we will go forward. Despite the sticks in the wheels that are stuck in ours at every move, we will overcome this together,” Prigozhin stated.
Prigozhin is at odds with the Russian army chiefs, together with Defense Minister Sergey Shoygu and head of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov.
The head of the Wagner group many occasions publicly doubted the competence of the Russian Defense Ministry and its prime 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.anews.com.tr
