In the Central African Republic, local insurgents ambushed militants of the Russian private military company Wagner. The rebels blew up an armored car of mercenaries moving in the direction of the village of Bombo.
Wagner’s mercenaries have been in the country since 2020, where clashes with those who did not recognize their results have arisen with the new government since the presidential election. Russian mercenaries are fighting on the side of government troops. However, the country’s authorities accuse the Wagner group of killing and torturing civilians.
It should be noted that in June 2021, UN investigators published a report on the war crimes of Russian mercenaries of the Wagner APC before the war crimes in the Central Asian Republic, in particular, they robbed houses and shot civilians.
In September 2021, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that Wagnerians would go to Mali to “fight terrorists.” Such actions are aimed at strengthening Russia’s influence on the territory of West Africa.
Russian propaganda creates a positive image of the Wagnerians as “fighters for justice throughout the world.” The film “Tourist” depicts militants as “peacekeepers” who teach local soldiers combat tactics and repel the attack of criminal groups that attack the capital for a coup. Russian instructors repel enemies. This plot is very close to recent events that happened in the CAR.
World human rights organizations accuse the Kremlin of trying to avoid responsibility for human rights abuses by using Wagner militants in various local conflicts.
Yevgeny Prigogine is called by the media the main sponsor of the Wagner group. He is close to Vladimir Putin and is included to the US sanctions list, which supported the aggression against Ukraine.