The United States will this week announce actions to hold the Russian mercenary Wagner Group accountable, the U.S. State Department spokesperson said on Tuesday, for its activities in Africa and unrelated to its aborted mutiny in Russia.
Spokesperson Matt Miller did not detail at a daily press briefing what the planned U.S. action would be.
“These are actions that we are taking against Wagner not in relation to events that happened this weekend but for their prior activities,” Miller said, adding that those involved countries in Africa.
A clash between Moscow and Wagner was averted on Saturday after the heavily armed mercenaries withdrew from the southern Russian city of Rostov under a deal that halted their advance on the capital.
Russian President Vladimir Putin initially vowed to crush the mutiny, which was the biggest blow to his authority in 23 years, comparing it to the wartime turmoil that ushered in the revolution of 1917 and then a civil war, but hours later a deal was clinched to allow Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin and some of his fighters to go to Belarus.
Prigozhin “is in Belarus today,” Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko was quoted as saying by state news agency BELTA on Tuesday.
The Wagner militia forces have played an increasingly central role in the long-running internal conflicts of Mali and Central African Republic.
It has also been fighting in Ukraine following the Russian army’s invasion of its neighbor 16 months ago.
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