The Kremlin signaled Tuesday that Wagner Group boss Yevgeny Prigozhin could soon find himself the target of an assassination attempt.
Although Prigozhin is widely reported to have pissed off many officials in Vladimir Putin’s orbit with his antics in Ukraine, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said it is actually authorities in Kyiv that Prigozhin should worry about.
Prigozhin himself claimed earlier Tuesday that he’d been briefed on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and CIA director William Burns supposedly getting together to discuss his assassination.
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“This is more of a question for the special services,” Peskov told reporters when asked about the allegation.
“But as for assassination attempts, Ukraine is involved in both assassination attempts and an absolutely monstrous murder. Let's remember the assassination attempts that took place. Let's remember the murder of [Daria] Dugina and so forth. The involvement of the Kyiv regime in such assassination attempts is obvious, so there is such a danger to our citizens,” Peskov said.
The “assassination” claim originally came from Vladimir Rogov, one of Russia’s proxy leaders in Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia region.
“One of the requests Zelensky made [during a meeting with the CIA director] was the murder of the Wagner boss, Mr. Prigozhin,” Rogov told Russian state media, without elaborating on where he’d gotten this information. He went on to say assassinating Prigozhin would be “more than logical.”
Prigozhin, appearing to relish in the prospect of acquiring martyr status in Russian society, quipped through his press service that killing him was a “very good idea.”
“I agree that it’s time to eliminate Prigozhin. If they turn to me, I will definitely assist,” he joked.
Even some pro-war Russian commentators were quick to point out on social media that the biggest threat for the Wagner boss is more likely right at home.
“It seems to me that those who are most interested in Prigozhin's elimination are located near the Kremlin,” one commentator wrote. “They’ll just leak information about [his] movements and locations to the Ukrainians.”
