Who are the Wagner Group, and why are they in Ukraine?
The Inquiry
BBC
4.6 • 1.7K Ratings
🗓️ 17 March 2022
⏱️ 24 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
According to media reports, Ukraine's president, Volodymyr Zelensky, has survived two assassination attempts from the band of mercenaries known as the Wagner Group. Their ruthlessness has earned them a feared reputation from Kyiv to Central Africa. But who are they, and has Putin really entrusted them with taking out a head of state?
(Pro-Russian separatists patrol with armoured vehicles in Donetsk, Ukraine 11 March 2022. Getty Images)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is the inquiry on the BBC World Service with me, Kavita Puri, each week one question |
| 0:14.4 | four expert witnesses and an answer. |
| 0:25.7 | Russian troops are moving closer to Kiev, but have they already been shadowy Russian fighters in Ukraine's capital? |
| 0:37.7 | A Times of London report suggests 400 mercenaries are already operating in the city. |
| 0:43.7 | It says they were sent to assassinate Ukraine's president Vladimir Zelensky and high-profile targets, including the cabinet and the Klitschko brothers. |
| 0:53.7 | These reports haven't been confirmed, but who are these mysterious fighters for higher? |
| 1:06.7 | For years, Ukraine has said men from a private military organisation with ties to the Kremlin have been operating in the disputed parts of eastern Ukraine. |
| 1:18.7 | They're called the Vagna Group, and they're found in trouble spots all around the world, leaving a trail of dead bodies and destruction. |
| 1:27.7 | Could they now be in Kiev? |
| 1:30.7 | So this week on the inquiry we ask, who are the Vagna Group, and what are they doing in Ukraine? |
| 1:42.7 | Parts one, plausible deniability. |
| 1:48.7 | The head of the Vagna Group, he is an admirer of this composer, Vagna. |
| 1:57.7 | Our first expert is Sergei Sukhunkin from Jamestown Foundation, a think tank in Virginia, America. |
| 2:04.7 | And that is how the group acquired its name. |
| 2:08.7 | The man who gave the group its name is Dimitri Utkin. |
| 2:11.7 | He's reported to have a high regard for the third Reich, and Vagna, after all, was one of Hitler's favourite composers. |
| 2:19.7 | Utkin was in the Russian Special Forces until 2013, before becoming the military commander of the Vagna Group, the unit of mercenaries, soldiers for higher. |
| 2:31.7 | The kind of person he recruited. |
| 2:34.7 | He was basically a middle-aged man, somewhere between 35 and 50, usually with a family, with mortgages, that they can't repay. |
| 2:44.7 | Usually they reside not in Moscow, not in major cities, so they have very little opportunities. |
| 2:52.7 | They trained for up to three months next to the grounds of the Russian military intelligence, raising eyebrows about how closely they were working with them. |
| 3:02.7 | And these were men used to being in conflict zones. |
... |
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