On June 27, the business jets of Yevgeny Prigozhin, the leader of Wagner private military company who was allowed to leave to Belarus after an unsuccessful armed insurrection in Russia, arrived in Minsk.
Belaruski Hayun, a Belarusian activist monitoring group, reported based on Flight Radar data, that Prigozhin’s business jet (registration number RA-02795) landed at Machulishchi military airfield near Minsk at 7:40.
Another one of his jets arrived from Russia: a BAe 125-800B business jet with registration number RA-02878 took off from St. Petersburg and landed at Machulyschi military airfield at 7:58.
On June 25, Prigozhin’s jet was seen making a trip from St. Petersburg to Rostov-on-Don, Vazhnye Istorii reported, citing Flight Radar data.
The one with the registration number RA-02795 took off from St. Petersburg and turned off its transponder, an identification device, near the Rostov Oblast, likely coming to pick up Prigozhin. The Wagner leader was seen the last time on 24 June in Rostov-on-Don, a city in southern Russia which PMC Wagner’s fighters had seized control of after Prigozhin announced a “march of justice” on Moscow.
Around 18:00 on the same day, the plane reappeared on radar over the Tambov Oblast and returned to St. Petersburg by 19:00.
Wagner coup: what happened earlier
As known reported, after claiming that the Russian Ministry of Defense delivered a missile strike on the flanks of Wagner PMC and announcing a “march for justice” on the night of 24 June and seizing control of Rostov-on-Don, the headquarters of Russia’s invasion army, Wagner financier Yevgeny Prigozhin was prosecuted for organizing an armed insurrection and faced up to 20 years in prison.
In a televised address on Saturday morning, Vladimir Putin said that all those who had “chosen the path of blackmail and terrorist methods” would be punished. According to Ukrainian intelligence, the Russian dictator urgently left Moscow for Valdai, which is between Moscow and St.Petersburg.
Prigozhin refused to lay down arms and said that Wagner mercenaries were the true “patriots” of Russia. The Russian media outlet Vazhnye Istorii wrote, referring to its sources in the Presidential Administration, that the Kremlin tried to negotiate with Prigozhin but got rejected.
The press service of Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko reported that the Belarusian leader had been in talks with Prigozhin all day on 25 June on behalf of Putin. A few minutes after this news, the owner of the PMC announced that his mercenaries were returning to the field camps as they were only 200 km from Moscow.
The Kremlin announced that the criminal charges against Prigozhin will be dropped and he will depart to Belarus. On the night of 25 June, Prigozhin departed from Rostov, with bystanders cheering him on.
Russia lost seven aircraft during the mutiny, as Wagner forces shot down the forces deployed to thwart the insurrection. Russian pro-war Telegram channels estimate that 13-20 Russian servicemen were killed. Additionally, an oil depot in the Voronezh Oblast was blown up, and 19 houses and roads were damaged by the march of Prigozhin’s private army in Russia, according to Russian pro-war media and Telegram channels.
