Victims of plane crash that killed Prigozhin had hand grenade fragments in their bodies, Putin claims
Vladimir Putin has claimed fragments of a hand grenade were found in the bodies of people who died in the plane crash that killed Russian mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin.
The private Embraer jet crashed north of Moscow on 23 August, killing all 10 people on board, including Wagner mercenary group boss Mr Prigozhin and the group’s founder Dmitry Utkin.
Western officials have claimed the plane may have been shot down by the Kremlin in retaliation for Mr Prigozhin leading a failed uprising against Vladimir Putin in June.
Mr Putin told a meeting of the Valdai Discussion Club in the Black Sea resort of Sochi that experts investigating the crash found no indication the plane had suffered an “external impact”.
Hinting the plane was blown up from inside the aircraft by, Putin said: “Fragments of hand grenades were found in the bodies of those killed in the crash.
“There was no external impact on the plane – this is already an established fact.”
Mr Putin did not give any more details about how a grenade or grenades could have been detonated on board, but said he thought investigators were wrong to have not carried out alcohol and drug tests on the bodies of those who died in the crash.
“In my opinion, such an examination should have been carried out but it was not,” he said.
He added FSB security service officers had searched Wagner’s offices in St Petersburg and found 10 billion roubles (around £81.8m) in cash and 5kg of cocaine.
The investigators of the crash have yet to report publicly on the cause.
During Wagner’s coup attempt, group marched towards Russia’s capital city, Moscow and its Telegram channel claimed the country would “soon have a new president”.
At the time, Prigozhin claimed his men were met with little resistance and reached within 125 miles of Moscow. But the uprising ended after the warlord turned his troops around.
Military experts believe Mr Prigozhin’s failed rebellion weakened Putin’s grip on Russia because it led to his inner circle losing faith in him.
After the failed rebellion, Mr Putin and Mr Prigozhin agreed on a deal for the warlord to be exiled to Belarus, with the country’s president Alexander Lukashenko claiming he helped broker the arrangement.
Prigozhin became known as “Putin’s chef” and he was eventually handed lucrative government catering contracts.
He set up the Wagner Group around the time that Russia illegally annexed Crimea in 2014 but denied being its leader for years.
Wagner was first deployed to fight in eastern Ukraine in 2014, where it supported Russian-backed separatist groups in the country’s Donbas region.
Additional reporting by Associated Press.
