Wagner PMC With 50,000 Militants Became Key In War With Ukraine - British Intelligence

The Wagner private military company has up to 50,000 militants involved in the war in Ukraine. Thus, it became a key component of the Russian military campaign.

This was reported by the British Ministry of Defence on Twitter.

According to the Russian Unified State Register, the proxy paramilitary Wagner Group had formally registered as a legal entity. The group declared their core activity as ‘management consultancy’; no mention was made of combat services.

“It is not yet clear to what extent the ‘PMC Wagner Centre’ entity will be used to administer Wagner’s paramilitary activity. Private Military Companies (PMCs) remain illegal in Russia, despite protracted discussion about reforming the law,” the report said.

The British Ministry of Defence says, Wagner owner Yevgeny Prigozhin has likely partially funded the organisation via inflated government contracts awarded to his other companies.

“The registration continues the remarkably rapid development of the traditionally opaque group’s public profile. Prigozhin only admitted to founding Wagner in September 2022; in October 2022, it opened a glossy HQ in St Petersburg,” the report says.

According to British intelligence, Wagner includes 50,000 people in Ukraine and the group " has become a key component of the Ukraine campaign."

"The registration likely aims to maximise Prigozhin’s commercial gain and to further legitimise the increasingly high-profile organisation," the British Ministry of Defence notes.

Ukrainian News Agency has already reported that the Kremlin has begun a struggle for the favor of the Russian dictator Vladimir Putin, so the current commander of the joint grouping of Russian troops in Ukraine Valery Gerasimov will try to remove the founder of the Wagner PMC Yevgeny Prigozhin.

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