So far, the Russian mercenary army Wagner was mainly stationed in Africa – now the dubious fighters are being transferred to Ukraine to support Russia’s offensive.
“We heard what’s happening in Ukraine,” says the commander of an elite unit in the Central African Army. The Video is currently circulating on African media and social networks. Next to the officer, around a dozen soldiers in combat gear are standing at attention. “The Russian soldiers are carrying out a special operation to bring peace,” it continues. “We African soldiers are ready to support our Russian brothers.”
In fact, Russia’s campaign of conquest in Ukraine is receiving help from Africa. Because the private Russian security company “Wagner” has been stationed on the continent for a few years. This is now increasingly recruiting African mercenaries to help Russian troops in Ukraine. A tweet from Ukraine’s Donbass region said two Central African fighters had died at the front. A photo of the two in combat gear and the black Wagner skull and crossbones badge on their shoulders circulates on Twitter, alongside photos of their passports: in Cyrillic script.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced in early March that Wagner mercenaries had launched a real hunt for him in order to assassinate him. He had already escaped snipers four times: Wagner’s special units.
In many conflict zones in Africa, journalists, UN employees and diplomats only dare to whisper the name “Wagner”. The Russian mercenaries are notorious, controversial and feared wherever they go. Rightly so: in 2018, three Russian journalists were brutally murdered in Central Africa when they wanted to follow in Wagner’s footsteps. According to Wagner’s own website, the company has up to 50,000 mercenaries stationed on the African continent: from Mauritania to Mali to Mozambique and Madagascar.
Their traces are usually not very visible: secret agreements with African governments, secret stationing of troops in Africa’s war zones. Usually only the modern Russian war equipment is visible – from attack helicopters to laser-guided mortar systems, as they were used in Libya and which will certainly not end up in private hands without the consent of the Kremlin. And the handwriting of violence and destruction that Wagner left behind is always visible – as is currently the case in the Ukraine.
Bodyguard units in the Central African war zone
In no other country in Africa has Wagner become as established as in the Central African Republic. A bloody civil war has been raging in the destitute country since 2013. At that time, Muslim rebels took over the capital Bangui and overthrew the government. The already ailing army had disintegrated, militias rule the country beyond the capital. The former protecting power and former colonial power France withdrew its soldiers after the coup, who had provided a little security. When President Faustin Touadera came to power through elections in 2016, he feared for his life. So he signed a secret treaty with Moscow. Since then, elite Russian fighters have provided Touadera’s bodyguard unit.
Russia’s military should officially send instructors to train Central African soldiers. Since the United Nations had imposed an arms embargo on the country, these 300 instructors were only allowed to enter the country unarmed and without military equipment. Unofficially, however, well over 1,000 Wagner mercenaries came, in full combat uniform, with machine guns and attack helicopters. The then Interior and Security Minister Sergei Bokassa, son of the former dictator who is responsible for the immigration authorities, complained that he was not even allowed to check the Russians’ passports.
Since then, the mercenaries have left a trail of violence in the already war-torn country. A UN investigative group released a 250-page report on Wagner’s human rights crimes in the country in 2021. These include: “Mass summary executions, arbitrary arrests, torture during interrogations, enforced disappearances, forced evictions of civilians, indiscriminate attacks on civilian facilities, violations of the right to health and increasing attacks on humanitarian actors and rape of women and girls”. The clear conclusion of the UN expert team: war crimes.
Nigerian Chris Kwaja is responsible for this UN expert group on Africa. He fears that the example of the Central African Republic will also set a precedent in other countries where Wagner is stationed: “If we don’t deal with the consequences of these Wagner deals in country A, the tendency is for the same things to happen in country B or C happen, very high,” says Kwaja.
Wagner – an extension of the Russian military intelligence service
For Joseph Siegle, director of the Africa Center for Strategic Studies in Washington, Wagner is not just a private security company, but the “extended arm of the Russian military intelligence service GRU,” according to the analyst: “It can be deployed abroad as cheaply and effectively as possible ” – circumventing the law and order. “Wagner operates under the radar because everything can be denied, including human rights crimes,” says Siegle. And so Moscow officially rejects any connection to Wagner.
The name “Wagner” is the combat name of Russian Lieutenant Colonel Dmitri Utkin, a veteran parachutist in the GRU special forces. After retiring in 2013, he had the Russian security company Slavonic Corps deploy him first to Iraq and later to eastern Ukraine and Crimea, like many former soldiers whose state pension is insufficient.
Then his company was dissolved by a Russian court. Mercenary activity is officially illegal in Russia. Shortly thereafter, he presented himself in the Donbass under a new company name: “Wagner”, named after Hitler’s favorite composer. Utkin makes no secret of his passion for the Third Reich: he wears a Wehrmacht helmet at the front and his SS tattoos on his neck are clearly visible.
In Eastern Europe, Utkin recruited fighters from former war zones: Chechens, Serbs, Albanians. In 2014, Wagner first took over control of Crimea, then Luhansk, Donetsk and the Donbass region – probably on behalf of Moscow. Wagner then expanded into Syria, where the company was hired by local President Bashar al-Assad to protect oil fields from rebels. They fought several battles there. For this, Utkin received a medal for bravery from Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Behind Utkin’s company, which is officially registered in Argentina, is the oligarch Yevgeny Prigozhin, known by the nickname “Putin’s cook” because his catering company cooks lunches for Russia’s army and state schools, a contract worth billions. Prigozhin, whose private fortune is estimated at over $200 million, is a close friend of Putin. He is also considered the man behind the troll agency “Internet Research Agency”, which allegedly tried to influence the presidential elections in the USA in 2016 via false internet reports. Prigozhin is now on US and European sanctions lists.
Departure from Africa – towards Ukraine
For Putin, Prigozhin seems to be the last resort in his Ukraine campaign. Because while regular Russian troops at the front are suffering losses due to the surprising resistance of the Ukrainian army, Putin’s shadow army is arming itself all over Africa. Last week, Ukraine’s Defense Ministry reported that Libyan General Khalifa Haftar, who fought shoulder to shoulder with Wagner in Libya, was ready to send fighters to support the Russian army. In the Central African Republic, the Wagner units have already been “significantly reduced,” according to UN experts responsible for monitoring the arms embargo. The BBC spoke to a Wagner fighter in Central Africa. He explained that the mercenaries had been invited to “a picnic in Ukraine”. In the run-up to the Ukraine war, Wagner launched an international recruitment appeal. According to the interviewed mercenary, this is primarily aimed at “people with previous convictions, debts, those excluded from mercenary groups”; i.e. criminals who are no longer accepted into any regular army.
Apparently, Wagner is currently in the process of internationalizing himself, ie hiring non-Russian fighters as well – despite Utkin’s rather fascist views. It is now possible to apply to Wagner online. Image galleries show heavily armed, uniformed men in front of a wall of fire. In the middle an eagle holding a skull in its claws. “Join Wagner,” reads the appeal, “to protect the peace and tranquility of the civilian population from bandits and terrorists!”
Pauline Bax from the think tank International Grisis Group (ICG) doubts that this will work: “These men have to be paid,” says Bax. According to the analyst, the salary, which is worth several thousand dollars, is paid for through lucrative contracts with the governments in the respective countries. In the Central African Republic, Wagner fighters protect gold and diamond mines that the Russian company M-Invest has taken over from Prigozhin via subsidiaries. In the north of the country they are stationed on the borders with Chad and Sudan, where they also collect customs duties. In Libya and Syria they secured oil fields, a kind of gold mine. Bax explains that Wagner is a “profit-oriented company” that is not financed by Russian state funds but is self-supporting. According to Bax, if Wagner doesn’t receive any lucrative mining contracts, then “they pay their wages through raids and looting”.