Russian Leaders Pledge Loyalty to Putin
After the Wagner Group’s weekend insurrection, Moscow’s political frailty seems to be at an all-time high.
Welcome back to World Brief, where this week I’m coming to you from the incredible mountain landscape of Aspen, Colorado, for the Aspen Ideas Festival.
Welcome back to World Brief, where this week I’m coming to you from the incredible mountain landscape of Aspen, Colorado, for the Aspen Ideas Festival.
Today, we’re looking at Russian leaders’ efforts to portray internal stability amid the Wagner Group coup threat; election results in Guatemala, Greece, and Germany; and an attack on Sierra Leone’s opposition party.
Moscow’s Mayhem Isn’t Over Yet
Top Russian officials rallied around President Vladimir Putin in a clear sign of support for the Kremlin on Monday, two days after paramilitary Wagner Group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin seized the strategic city of Rostov-on-Don and began an advance toward the capital.
“We need to act together, as one team, and maintain the unity of all forces,” Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin said in a televised address. However, the crisis is far from over: Mishustin admitted that the apparent attempted coup was a direct challenge to Russia’s stability. In a late Monday speech, Putin repeated unsubstantiated neo-Nazi allegations and appealed to “those who were deceptively pulled into the criminal adventure”—likely, though not explicitly, acknowledging Wagner Group fighters.
The mayhem began late last Friday, when Prigozhin accused Russian troops of killing Wagner forces in a targeted missile strike. Prigozhin has worked with Kremlin officials to forward a Russian victory in Ukraine, but he has also been a thorn in Putin’s side. On Friday, his criticisms escalated; he accused the Russian leader of lying to top officials in February 2022, when Russia first invaded Ukraine, and marched toward Moscow with dozens of tanks and fighting vehicles in tow.
“At the very least, that Prigozhin’s army was able to travel hundreds of miles unhindered shows that the Kremlin lacks the wherewithal to put down a domestic rebellion, especially when its best troops are fighting in Ukraine,” Russia expert Lucian Kim, who formerly reported in Moscow, argued in Foreign Policy.
Prigozhin went even further the following day, calling for Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu’s and army chief Valery Gerasimov’s removal. Although Russian authorities released a video of Shoigu on Monday—his first public appearance since the attempted insurrection—it is unclear if the Kremlin will concede to Prigozhin’s demands.
Through a deal negotiated by Belarusian President Aleksandr Lukashenko on Saturday, Wagner fighters will be offered immunity if they withdraw from their posts. Prigozhin himself is set to fly to Belarus this week, choosing exile in exchange for Russia dropping criminal charges. However, the Kremlin announced on Monday that it will continue investigating the insurrection. Prigozhin has denied that he tried to overthrow Putin but doubled down on his criticism of the Russian military.
On Monday, Josep Borrell, the European Union’s top envoy, said Russia’s military looked fragile. “It’s not a good thing to see that a nuclear power like Russia can go into a phase of political instability,” he said. Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky acknowledged that Russian infighting could leave the country vulnerable to Ukrainian advances. “For a long time, Russia used propaganda to mask its weakness and the stupidity of its government,” Zelensky tweeted. “And now there is so much chaos that no lie can hide it.”
Today’s Most Read
- Prigozhin’s Mutiny Is the Beginning of Putin’s End by Lucian Kim
- Putin’s Armor Has Been Pierced by Jeffrey A. Sonnenfeld, Jon M. Huntsman Jr., and William F. Browder
- Prigozhin’s Defiant Stand: ‘How Did We Get to This Situation?’ by Robbie Gramer
The World This Week
Tuesday, June 27: NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg concludes a two-day visit to Lithuania.
Wednesday, June 28: European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen meets with the prime ministers of Finland, Estonia, and Bulgaria.
Saturday, July 1: Spain assumes the six-month presidency of the Council of the European Union.
Sunday, July 2, to Monday, July 3: Pakistani Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari visits Japan.
Sunday, July 2, to Tuesday, July 4: French President Emmanuel Macron visits Germany.
Monday, July 3, to Tuesday, July 4: Argentina hosts the Mercosur leaders’ summit.
What We’re Following
Ballot-filled weekend. Former Guatemalan first lady Sandra Torres and center-left candidate Bernardo Arévalo face a presidential runoff on Aug. 20 following Sunday’s inconclusive first round of voting, with no candidate reaching a simple majority. Torres, who campaigned on expanded social welfare, won 15.8 percent of the vote; Arévalo, whose anti-corruption movement represented public anger with political elites, secured 11.8 percent.
Ahead of the vote, Guatemala’s electoral court disqualified numerous candidates who defied the status quo, a move rights activists warned was a direct threat to the country’s democracy. But Arévalo’s surprise win may have thrown a wrench in what could have been a win for the ruling class.
Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis will return for a second term following Sunday’s repeat election win. His center-right New Democracy party took more than half of the Greek Parliament’s seats, well ahead of the leftist Syriza party. Mitsotakis has promised to push economic reforms that will alleviate the country’s debt crisis, increase tourist revenue, and raise wages. But he will also continue to implement strict immigration policies despite public condemnation.
Meanwhile, the far-right Alternative for Germany party won a local mayoral election in Sonneberg, Germany, on Sunday. Robert Sesselmann defeated the Christian Democrats’ Jurgen Köpper with 52.8 percent of the vote. The victory marks the first time the alt-right party, known for its anti-immigrant, antisemitic rhetoric, has ever won a district council election.
“This is the bursting of a dam, which the political powers in this country cannot simply take on the chin,” said Josef Schuster, the president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany.
Violence in Sierra Leone. Not all of this weekend’s elections went smoothly. In Sierra Leone, senior officials from the opposition All People’s Congress accused the country’s military of attacking the party’s headquarters while staff were counting Saturday’s general election ballots. The party’s candidate for president, Samura Kamara, had rallied his supporters in Freetown when live ammunition and tear gas were reportedly shot into the crowd gathered outside. Sierra Leone’s national security agency has denied the military’s involvement.
This is not the first time the All People’s Congress has accused the government of bias in favor of the ruling Sierra Leone People’s Party. Nonetheless, despite claims of vote tampering, provisional results predict that incumbent President Julius Maada Bio will win another term with 60 percent support.
Odds and Ends
On Saturday, nine men attending a bachelor party in Italy on Saturday found out that not all ideas are good ideas when their prank kidnapping of the groom went horribly wrong. The partiers pretended to be Islamic State terrorists, holding fake weapons and balaclavas. But Italian police immediately descended on the party, and the nine men were charged on Monday with “causing public alarm.” The groom remained inside during the entire encounter—unaware that it was a joke at all.
Alexandra Sharp is the World Brief writer at Foreign Policy. Twitter: @AlexandraSSharp
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Russia: After Prigozhin's Wagner Coup, Leaders Pledge Loyalty to Putin - Foreign Policy
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