Military coup in Russia? The head of Wagner’s mercenaries declares mutiny, claiming that his army has entered Rostov.

The owner of the Wagner private military contractor on Friday called for an armed uprising aimed at ousting Russia’s defense minister, in his most direct challenge yet to the Kremlin. The security services reacted immediately by calling for the arrest of Yevgeny Prigozhin and the opening of a criminal investigation. In a sign of how seriously the Kremlin is taking the threat, security was beefed up in Moscow and Rostov-on-Don, which is home to the Russian military headquarters for the southern region and also oversees fighting in Ukraine.

Although the outcome of the confrontation was still unclear, it appeared that it could further hinder Moscow’s war effort as Kiev’s forces were probing Russian defenses in the early stages of a counter-offensive. Prigozhin claimed early Saturday that his forces had crossed into Russia from Ukraine and reached Rostov, adding that he had encountered no resistance from young soldiers at checkpoints and that his forces were “not fighting against children”. “

“But we will destroy anyone who comes in our way,” he said in a series of angry videos and audio recordings posted on social media since late Friday. “We are moving forward and will move forward till the end.” He claimed that the Chief of the General Staff, General Valery Gerasimov, sent warplanes to attack Wagner’s convoy, which was moving alongside normal vehicles.

Despite Prigozhin’s statement that Wagner’s convoy had entered Rostov-on-Don, there has yet to be any confirmation of this on Russian social networks. Videos showed heavy trucks blocking highways leading to the city, long convoys of National Guard trucks seen on a road outside Rostov-on-Don, and armored vehicles roaming the streets.

Prigozhin said that Wagner field camps in Ukraine were attacked with rockets, helicopter gunships and artillery fire on Gerasimov’s orders after a meeting with Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu in which he decided to destroy Wagner. Wagner forces played a key role in Russia’s war in Ukraine, succeeding in capturing the town of Bakhmut where the bloodiest and longest fighting took place. But Prigozhin has criticized Russia’s military authorities, accusing them of incompetence and depriving its troops of arms and ammunition.

Prigozhin said late Friday that his troops would punish Shoigu in an armed rebellion and urged the army not to resist. Prigozhin declared, “This is not a military coup, but a march of justice.”

The National Anti-Terrorism Committee, which is part of the Federal Security Services, or FSB, has charged him with calling for an armed insurrection, which carries a prison sentence of up to 20 years.

The FSB urged Wagner’s contract soldiers to arrest Prigozhin and refuse to obey his “criminal and treacherous orders”. It called his statements “stabbing Russian soldiers in the back” and said they tantamount to inciting armed conflict in Russia.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said President Vladimir Putin has been informed of the situation and “all necessary measures are being taken.”

Heavy military trucks and armored vehicles were seen in several parts of central Moscow early Saturday, and soldiers with assault rifles were deployed outside the main Defense Ministry building. The area around the Presidential Administration near Red Square was blocked off, disrupting traffic.

But even amid the increased military presence, the city’s bars and restaurants were packed with customers. In a club near the FSB headquarters, people were dancing on the street near the entrance.

Prigozhin, whose dispute with the Defense Ministry dates back years, refused to comply with a requirement that military contractors sign contracts with the ministry before 1 July. In a statement late Friday, he said he was ready to compromise but “they treacherously betrayed us.”

“Today they launched a rocket attack on our rear camps and a large number of our comrades were killed,” he said. The Ministry of Defense denied the attack on the Wagner camps.

Prigozhin claimed that Shoigu personally went to the Russian military headquarters in Rostov-on-Don to direct the attack and then “cowardly” fled.

He said of Shoigu, “This filth will be stopped.”

Shouting, “The evil committed by the country’s military leadership must be stopped,” he urged the military to offer no resistance against Wagner as he moved in to “restore justice.”

Colonel General Sergei Surovikin, deputy commander of the Russian group fighting in Ukraine, urged Wagner forces to stop any moves against the army, saying it would play into the hands of Russia’s enemies, who are “waiting to see “The Deterioration of Our Domestic Political Situation.”

Tatiana Stanovaya, a political analyst, predicted that this would be the end of Prigozhin.

He tweeted, “Now that the state is actively involved, there is no turning back.” “The end is near for Prigozhin and Wagner. Now the only possibility is complete destruction, the only variable being the degree of resistance of the Wagner Group. Surovikin was sent to persuade them to surrender. Confrontation seems completely futile.”

A top military officer, Lieutenant General Vladimir Alekseyev, described Prigozhin’s move as “madness”, threatening to spark a civil war.

“It is like backstabbing the country and the President,” he said. “It is impossible to imagine a stronger blow to the image of Russia and its armed forces. Such provocation can only be done by the enemies of Russia.

The Defense Ministry said in a statement that Ukraine’s military was concentrating troops to attack around Bakhmut to take advantage of “Prigozhin’s provocation”. It said Russian artillery and warplanes were firing on Ukrainian forces as they prepared to launch an offensive in the area.

In other developments in the Ukraine war, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called on other countries to heed warnings that Russia may be planning to attack an occupied nuclear power plant to create a radiation disaster.

Members of his government briefed international delegates about the potential threat to the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant, whose six reactors have been shut down for months. Zelensky said he hoped other countries would “give appropriate signals and put pressure” on Moscow.

A Kremlin spokesman denied that the plant was under threat from the Russian military.

The potential for life-threatening emissions of radiation has been a concern since Russian troops invaded Ukraine last year and seized the plant, Europe’s largest nuclear power station. The head of the United Nations Atomic Energy Agency spent months trying to negotiate the establishment of a security perimeter to protect the facility as the surrounding area came under repeated shelling, but he was unsuccessful.

The International Atomic Energy Agency noted on Thursday that “the military situation has become increasingly tense” while an ongoing Ukrainian counteroffensive is underway this month in Zaporizhia province, where the namesake plant is located, and adjacent parts of Donetsk province.

Although the last of the plant’s six reactors was shut down last fall to reduce the risk of meltdown, experts have warned that if power or water is lost to the system that keeps the reactors’ cores and spent nuclear fuel cool. If it does, radiation may be released.

During months of fighting, Russia and Ukraine traded allegations over which side was posing a threat to the plant. Ukrainian officials have accused Russia of mining the plant’s cooling system, which is already under threat from a dam collapse that has caused water to fall into a reservoir used by the power station.