Head of the Wagner mercenary group Yevgeny Prigozhin at the funeral of Russian military blogger Vladlen Tatarsky in Moscow, April 8, 2023.
Moscow – Head of the Russian Wagner mercenary group (in Russian Wagner's transcript) of Yevgeny Prigozhin in the afternoon denied his earlier statement today that a ceasefire was planned for Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine due to the visit of American journalists. According to the Kommersant newspaper, he said he was only joking about the temporary truce. His mercenary group is the main force on the Russian side in Bakhmut, which Russia has been trying to conquer since the summer.
Advertisement'; }
“A decision was taken to suspend artillery fire so that American journalists could film Bachmut in peace and return home,” Prigozhin originally said in a recording posted on the Telegram platform. He stated that, according to his information, the visit of American journalists to Bakhmut will be organized by one of the Ukrainian commanders known by the nickname Cerber.
However, Prigozhin later denied his announcement. “We can't get Cerberus, so we decided to laugh and I came up with a statement. It's a kind of military humor,” said the head of the Wagner group.
Ukrainian forces in Bakhmut, according to analysts from the American Institute for the Study of War, control only the western part of the city. Russia is making a huge effort to capture the city and, according to Kiev, it has already suffered heavy losses in the fighting for Bakhmut. Ukrainian ground forces commander Oleksandr Syrskyi said on Wednesday that Moscow is pursuing the city for propaganda reasons, so that it can claim partial success after months of Russian forces' advances in Ukraine practically halting.
