Putin breaks silence on Wagner boss Prigozhin, presumed dead in plane crash
Russian president Vladimir Putin breaks his silence on the plane crash a day earlier that reportedly killed mercenary boss Yevgeny Prigozhin and other senior members of the Wagner paramilitary group. "I have known Yevgeny Prigozhin for a very long time, since the early 1990s," Putin says. "He was a man of complicated fate, and he made serious mistakes in his life, but he achieved the right results."
Transcript
00:00 I have known Prigozhin for a long time, since the early 1990s.
00:07 He was a man of complicated fate, and he made serious mistakes in life.
00:13 He achieved the results he needed for himself and for the common cause, as I asked him to do,
00:23 as he has done in recent months.
00:26 He was a talented man, a talented businessman.
00:30 He worked not only in our country and achieved results, but also abroad, in Africa in particular.
00:37 He was involved in oil, gas, precious metals and stones.
00:43 He has just returned from Africa, as far as I know.
00:49 He met some officials here.
00:53 Indeed, if there were, and the initial data suggest that there were,
01:01 the employees of the Wagner company,
01:05 I would like to note that these are people who made a significant contribution
01:10 to our common cause of fighting the neo-Nazi regime in Ukraine.
01:16 We remember this, we know this, and we will not forget it.
01:20 [BLANK_AUDIO]