Kremlin Rehabilitates Wagner Mercenaries

In the regions of Russia bordering Ukraine, Wagner private military company (PMC) mercenaries have begun receiving the first veteran’s certificates attesting to participation in combat operations.

The certificate confirms their status as soldiers in the Russian armed forces and entitles them to various social benefits and payments from the Russian state.

According to the Center for National Resistance (CNR), Russian President Vladimir Putin himself ordered the issuance of such certificates to Wagner members, stating the need to regulate the activities of the Wagner PMC and “renew the rights” of members of this armed group previously in a state of legal limbo.

On Nov. 23, 2023, British intelligence reported that Wagner had been included in the command structure of the Russian Guard, indicating that some of Wagner’s representatives had been rehabilitated by the Russian administration.

The decision was made after a period of uncertainty about how the Kremlin would treat the Wagnerites after leader Yevgeny Prigozhin’s mutiny in June 2023. Later, Wagner members were assigned to the so-called Storm-Z units.

Storm-Z units are mostly comprised of former prisoners, but also include military personnel who were caught using alcohol or drugs, or who refused to follow orders. It is believed that the Russian Main Intelligence Directorate oversees the creation and use of such units.

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Moreover, thousands of prisoners served in the Wagner PMC. They had been recruited in penitentiary institutions throughout Russia, promised that if they managed to survive for six months, they would be allowed to go free. Many of those convicts had viral diseases such as hepatitis B, C, and HIV/AIDS, and would have to wear special bracelets.

Well before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the Wagner units were formed to participate in Russia’s initially covert invasion of eastern Ukraine in 2014. The militants later took part in the Syrian War and in operations in Africa, where Russia also supports local dictatorships in exchange for access to the continent’s mineral wealth.

On Nov. 6, 2023, Kyiv Post published exclusive videos showing Ukrainian special forces allegedly confronting Wagner fighters in a Sudanese city and shooting them at close range with RPGs.

Speaking to Kyiv Post, a Ukrainian source added: “The footage shows the work of, probably, special units of the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine (HUR).”

Russia was directly involved in the 2019 coup in Sudan through the Wagner PMC, which supported Gen. Hemedti and his Transitional Sovereignty Council (TSC). Wagner specifically provided surface-to-air missiles to the Rapid Response Force (RSF), the TSC’s military wing.

A senior Sudanese source told CNN that about 90 percent of the RSF’s weapons come from Wagner, adding that the supply has not stopped despite the deaths of Prigozhin and his deputy Dmitry Utkin in a plane crash in Russia last year.