Last weekend saw Vladimir Putin receive a painful blow from one of his closest allies, warlord Yevgeny Prigozhin.
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Wagner Group’s chief seized Rostov-on-Don, home to more than a million people and the Russian army's Southern Military District, and he made it Crimea style - without firing a single shot, beforeordering his mercenaries, many recruited from Russian prisons, to 'march on Moscow' in a bid to overthrow the ‘incompetent’ Russian Army chiefs.
Although the rebellion was aborted at the last minute, a movefacilitated by Belarus’s dictator Alexander Lukashenko, the world sensed panic that took over Vladimir Putin and the members of his ‘court’.
Prigozhin was exiled to live in Minsk and the situation with Wagner Groupremains unclear.
Sensing the Russian leader’s weakness following the aborted rebellion, Liberty of Russia Legion didn’t shun fiery language when addressing Kremlin. Here is what they said.
Liberty of Russia Legion threatens an uprising: 'No one can stop us'
The Liberty of Russia Legion commander who led his units in cross-border raids into Russia's Belgorod region in late May issued an ominous threat to Vladimir Putin.
The Ukraine-based organisation that mostly consists of Russian volunteers fed up with the political situation in the country believes that ‘the Kremlin is there for the taking’.
Liberty of Russia’s top commander, whose nom de guerre is Caesar, said the Wagner Group’s mutiny had revealed Russia's leader to be ‘fatally weak’ and had exposed all the cracks in his ‘rotten state’. Most importantly, he was not the only one seeing the back of the Russian leader.
Caesar claimed that regional elites were already deserting Vladimir Putin and ‘reaching out to the rebels’.
The commander also said his troops were ‘afraid of nothing’ and no one could stop them from ‘seizing power’ and ‘finishing off’ the President.
Caesar added:
With decisive action, it is possible to seize it. It's time to understand we have to put an end to Putin's regime - otherwise, he will drag the entire planet with him into hell.
He believed they were ‘Russia's only hope for liberation’ and ‘the only force that can put an end to this nightmare’. It was ‘a question of time’ before their banner was ‘flying above the Kremlin.’
Caesar explained that they were ‘gathering strength’ and ‘getting ready':
We want to stop the war, and then clean up our country - so she no longer behaves like a mad dog that runs around trying to bite its neighbours.
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Who are Liberty of Russia Legion?
Liberty of Russia is a Ukraine-based paramilitary group that consists of Russian volunteers who fight alongside Ukrainian troops against Russian forces and strongly oppose ‘Putin’s regime’.
They see their mission as the ‘liberation of Russia’ from the current leader’s tyranny.
The organisation is also known for using a white-blue-white flag, seen by part of the Russian opposition as the flag of ‘free Russia’.
Liberty of Russia’s fighters call them centrists. The size of the legion is unclear. Its website claims they are ‘fighting in full cooperation with the Armed Forces of Ukraine and under the leadership of the Ukrainian command’.
According to Caesar, ‘there are no people in the legion who were forced to join it’ and all members were contract soldiers with Ukraine's international legion, with a small number of Russian soldiers who had surrendered to Ukrainian forces.
Read more:
⋙ Vladimir Putin issues first statement since the failed Wagner rebellion, here's what he said
⋙ Vladimir Putin: Politicians issue worrying warning over war in Ukraine, 'the end is unpredictable'
Sources used:
- Express: ''No one can stop us': Putin warned it's not over yet as Russia Legion plans new revolt'
- BBC News: 'Belgorod raid: Who are the fighters infiltrating Russia from Ukraine?'