Three Russian journalists died in the Central African Republic who were filming an investigation about Russian mercenary soldiers from the Wagner private military company in one of the worlds most dangerous countries. Wagners financial sponsor is believed to be Russian businessman, Evgeny Prigozhin, suspected of meddling in the U.S. elections. The Bell investigated what Prigozhins fighters are up to in Africa.
Orkhan Dzhemal was one of Russias best known war correspondents. At the beginning of the 2000s, he led the political department of Novaya Gazeta, and then was a reporter for Russian Newsweek and Izvestiya. Dzhemal reported from the wars in Georgia (he wrote a book about the war), Libya, Syria, and east Ukraine. Recently, the only publication which regularly featured Dzhemal was Echo Moscow; here are the recordings and transcripts of his last reports.
Alexander Rastorguev was a documentary film director. His most famous piece was the project Term () about the Russian protests of 2012, which was filmed together with former NTV journalist, Alexey Pivovarov, and documentary filmmaker, Pavel Kostomarov.
Kirill Radchenko was a freelance photographer, and photographs credited with his surname were published on the website of ANNA News, an information agency which covers the conflicts in Syria and Ukraine. In 2017, he photographed events in Syria, where there was a civil war for many years. He was 33 years old.
The journalists trip was related to an investigation of the Wagner private military company, which was really actively involved in Africa. We will share everything that is known about this.
The Wagner private military company is connected to Evgeny Prigozhin who is referred to as Putins chef because companies close to him provided catering services to the Kremlin. They also received Ministry of Defense contracts worth several billion and delivered food to Moscow schools.
It became clear at the end of 2017 that Russian private military companies, including Wagner, had been sent to Africa, but then it was only known about their involvement in Sudan. The Bell, in turn, uncovered that Prigozhins companies appeared to have a commercial interest in that country right after last years negotiations between Vladimir Putin and Dmitry Medvedev with Sudans president, Omar al-Bashir. A company believed to be related to Prigozhin, M Invest, signed a concession agreement for gold mining in Sudan (we wrote about this in detail here). At the same time, Wagners hired troops trained Sudanese military divisions, which was then confirmed by four people who spoke with The Bell, including individuals from rival private military companies. One of these said that Wagner employees are also training the CAR army.
The Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced in March a strengthening of national military structures in CAR and that Russia sent 5 military and 170 civilian instructors to that country, as well as a shipment of small arms this was all at the request of the president of the CAR, Faustin-Archange Touadra, and with the agreement of the UN Security Council.
The investigative group, Conflict Intelligence Team (CIT), wrote that civil instructors might be from the Wagner private military company, and before that, this was also reported by several French media outlets.
In its statement, the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not mention Wagner, but said that in its agreement with the CAR, Russia also is looking into the possibility of the joint development of natural resources in that country, and that several mining concessions had begun to be realized in 2018.
It is not clear if Prigozhins structures are behind these concessions. But, it is possible that the universal operation scheme was implemented before an agreement was signed about gold mining in Sudan, as Wagners troops were seen in Syria. Later, it became clear that Prigozhins structures agreed with the Syrian government to participate in the liberation, defense and development of local oil and gas fields. In exchange, the company would be given access to of the oil and gas produced on liberated territories. These agreements were agreed in final just before the bloody encounter of Wagner troops with U.S. forces in the oil and gas province of Deir ez-Zor, The Bell learned.