The Kremlin has denied the publications that ensured that General Sergei Surovikin was aware of the rebellion of the Wagner mercenary group last weekend, as published by the American newspaper The New York Times. Another medium, The Moscow Times, has added more information about the fate of the military. According to the newspaper, Surovikin would be detained.
Based on sources from the Russian Ministry of Defense, The Moscow Times assures that the head of the Russian military campaign in Ukraine until November 2022 maintained alleged links with the founder and head of the Wagner Group, Yevgueni Prigozhin, the leader of the insurrection.
Russian President Vladimir Putin entrusted Sergei Surovikin in October last year to lead the military campaign in Ukraine. He left that responsibility in January 2023, when he was replaced by the Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces, Valeri Guerásimov. However, Surovikin continued to participate in the decision and execution of operations. In Russia he is known for his harshness as “General Armageddon”.
Surovikin, 56, was the only Russian military commander Prigozhin, in clashes with the military leadership, had publicly said he trusted. On Friday, June 23, when he announced that he was taking up arms with 25,000 men, several Russian generals released videos calling on Wagner’s mercenaries to desist.
“We have fought together, taken risks, we have won together. We are of the same blood, we are warriors. I ask you to stop. The enemy is precisely waiting for the situation to worsen in our country,” Surovikin said in his message.
“The matter with him was not OK. For the authorities. I can’t say more,” said one of the sources quoted by The Moscow Times indicating that he is in custody today.
According to the other source, “apparently he (Surovikin) chose (Wagner’s) side and they grabbed him by the balls.”
The veteran general, who was forged in conflicts of the 1990s such as the civil war in Tajikistan or the wars in Chechnya and more recently in Syria, has been missing from public view since Saturday, when the rebellion began and Prigozhin’s men they seized control of Rostov-on-Don, in southern Russia, and began a march on Moscow. The military mutiny ended on Saturday night, when an agreement was reached with the mediation of the President of Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko.
The Kremlin promised not to prosecute the insurgents and Prigozhin must live in exile in Belarus, where he already is.
When The Moscow Times asks its source about Surovikin’s whereabouts, it replies: “We are not even commenting on this information through our internal channels.”
Before the newspaper, the military blogger Vladimir Romanov assured that Surovkin was detained. He was reportedly detained already last Sunday and is currently in the Lefortovo detention center, he said.
Alexei Venediktov, former director of the Echo of Moscow radio station, wrote on Telegram that the prominent general had not contacted his family for three days.
On Wednesday, The New York Times, citing a group of US intelligence officials, reported that Surovikin was aware of Prigozhin’s plans to take up arms.
The Kremlin reacted by saying that it was “speculation”.
“Around these events there will now be a lot of speculation and conjecture. I think this is one of those examples,” Kremlin spokesman Dimitri Peskov said in his daily telephone briefing on Wednesday.
