In Washington, the Pentagon spokesman, Brig. Gen. Patrick S. Ryder, said Prigozhin was “likely” killed in the plane crash, according to an initial U.S. assessment, but that reports the plane was downed by a missile appeared “to be inaccurate.”
Here’s the latest on the war and its impact across the globe.
An explosion was detected along the path of the plane, but there were no signs of a missile launch, according to U.S. officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a preliminary assessment. The early uncertainty leaves open the possibility that the plane was sabotaged somehow, but precisely what happened to the Embraer private jet remains unclear, The Washington Post reported.
It is “highly likely” that Prigozhin is dead, although there is no “definitive proof,” Britain’s Defense Ministry said Friday. “Highly likely” means the ministry considers the probability that he is dead to be between 80 and 90 percent. “The demise of Prigozhin would almost certainly have a deeply destabilising effect on the Wagner Group,” the ministry added.
Putin made his comments amid widespread speculation that the Kremlin may have ordered the crash in response to Prigozhin’s short-lived mutiny in June — the most serious challenge to Putin’s rule in decades. Jailed Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny accused Putin of having “arranged to kill his soldier Prigozhin.” But pro-Kremlin analyst Sergei Markov said the president’s remarks were designed to stem speculation in Russia that he ordered the killings.
For many of Russia’s elites, the plane crash signaled Putin’s reassertion of control, analysts told The Post, given the long history of Putin’s foes, including journalists and opposition politicians, dying or falling ill in suspicious circumstances after opposing the Russian leader.
President Biden and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky spoke on Ukraine’s Independence Day, and Biden “reiterated the U.S. commitment to support Ukraine’s defense against Russian aggression for as long as it takes.” They agreed to begin training Ukrainian fighter pilots on F-16 fighter jets to “increase Ukraine’s defensive capabilities,” the White House said. Earlier, Zelensky reiterated that Ukraine had no involvement in the Russian plane crash.
Norway will give a number of F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine, Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store said, without specifying how many. “We have already decided to train Ukrainian fighter jet pilots and announced in the summer that we would provide two Norwegian F-16 jets for training purposes,” he said. Norway will disclose further details about additional F-16 donations to Ukraine on a later date, he added. The United States will begin instructing Ukrainian pilots in flying F-16 aircraft in Arizona in October, the Pentagon said.
The United States levied sanctions against Russians linked to the forcible deportation of Ukraine’s children. “Children are the most innocent victims of war: we have not forgotten Ukraine’s children,” the State Department said in a statement announcing the new penalties against more than a dozen individuals and entities.
Heineken said it has completed its exit from the Russian market at an expected loss of 300 million euros ($324 million), after selling its operations in the country to Russia’s Arnest Group for a symbolic one euro. The Dutch brewer, famous for its beers, said in a statement Friday that it had planned to leave the Russian market after the invasion of Ukraine began in 2022 but acknowledged “it took much longer than we had hoped.”
Ukraine is seeking armored medical evacuation vehicles from its supporters, Zelensky said, according to his office. Ukraine’s medical professionals are struggling to keep up with an increase in mine injuries since the start of the counteroffensive in June.
Russia’s Defense Ministry accused Ukraine of attempting dozens of drone attacks over Crimea, the peninsula Russia annexed illegally in 2014, although it claimed that Russian forces were able to destroy or intercept all of them. Russia has blamed Kyiv for a series of blasts in Crimea, including attacks on Russian military sites last year. Kyiv has not officially claimed the attacks while warning that they will continue as a result of the war.
Prigozhin’s presumed death casts fate of Wagner’s operations in doubt: The apparent deaths of Prigozhin and his top lieutenants have brought the Wagner mercenary group closer to an end, Mary Ilyushina and Francesca Ebel report. But the question remains: Which remnants of Wagner’s once-sprawling empire will Putin take over?
As an organization, Wagner is “really finished,” said David Lewis, a professor of global politics at Britain’s University of Exeter who has researched the group’s illicit business networks in Africa. Prigozhin would be “impossible to replace,” he said. But the Kremlin will seek to replicate Wagner’s blend of mercenaries, profitable business, smuggling and disinformation campaigns, he added.
Andrew Jeong, Adela Suliman, Robyn Dixon
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