Moscow: With a dramatic uprising against the Russian military that called into question President Vladimir Putin's authority, the millionaire mercenary chief who had long benefited from the strong patronage of Putin has gained international attention.

Owner of the Kremlin-backed Wagner Group, a private army of mercenaries and inmate recruits that has participated in some of the bloodiest battles in Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Yevgeny Prigozhin, 62, is a member of the Kremlin.

After calling for an armed uprising to remove the defence minister, Prigozhin abruptly escalated his harsh criticism of Russia's handling of the war on Friday. He then sent his hired soldiers rolling towards Moscow.

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The next day, Prigozhin abruptly resigned as Putin's administration scrambled to build checkpoints to surround Moscow and issue a "counterterrorism" alert. He was seen late Saturday retreating with his forces from Rostov-on-Don, a city in southern Russia where they had taken over the military headquarters, as part of the agreement to defuse the crisis. He had previously agreed to relocate to Belarus.
What Prigozhin, a former prisoner, hot dog vendor, and restaurant owner who has captured the attention of the entire world, would do next was unclear.

Both Prigozhin and Putin were born in Leningrad, which is now St. Petersburg, and have a long history together. Prigozhin served time in prison during the final years of the Soviet Union; he admits it was 10 years, but he doesn't specify for what.

Later, he ran a fancy restaurant that attracted Putin's attention before running a hot dog stand. The Russian president dined at one of them during his first term with Jacques Chirac, the president of France at the time.

In an interview that was published in 2011, Prigozhin recalled, "Vladimir Putin saw how I built a business out of a kiosk, and he saw that I don't mind serving to the esteemed guests because they were my guests."

His companies significantly grew to include catering and serving lunches at schools. Putin assisted in the opening of Prigozhin's factory in 2010, which was financed by a state bank with generous loans. His company Concord received contracts worth millions of dollars to supply meals at public schools just in Moscow. Additionally, for a number of years, he coordinated catering for Kremlin events, earning him the moniker "Putin's chef," and he has offered catering and utility services to the Russian military.

Alexei Navalny, a leader in the opposition and an outspoken opponent of corruption, charged Prigozhin's businesses with violating antitrust laws by competing for $387 million in Defence Ministry contracts.

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Additionally, Prigozhin is the owner of the Wagner Group, a Kremlin-affiliated mercenary group that has grown to be crucial to Putin's efforts to project Russian influence in unstable regions of the world.

The mercenary force is alleged by the United States, European Union, United Nations, and others to have taken part in conflicts, particularly in nations in Africa. In return for lucrative payments, which frequently include a share of gold or other natural resources, Wagner fighters are said to act as bodyguards for warlords or national leaders. US officials claim that Russia may also be supporting its conflict in Ukraine by using Wagner's work in Africa.

Prigozhin's mercenaries in Ukraine have grown to be a significant player in the conflict, engaging Ukrainian forces in combat while acting as the Russian army's equal.
That includes Wagner warriors conquering Bakhmut, the location of the bloodiest and longest battles. By the end of last month, the Wagner Group and Russian forces appeared to have largely won Bakhmut, a victory that, despite the cost in human lives, had little strategic significance for Russia. According to Prigozhin, 20,000 of his soldiers—about half of whom were prisoners recruited from Russian prisons—died in Bakhmut.

Wagner Group mercenaries have been charged with numerous human rights violations across Africa, including in the Central African Republic, Libya, and Mali, according to Western nations and UN experts.

The group was charged by the European Union in December 2021 with engaging in "destabilising activities" in the Central African Republic, Libya, Syria, and Ukraine, as well as "serious human rights abuses, including torture and extrajudicial, summary, or arbitrary executions and killings."

The gruesome brutality of some of the reported incidents made them stand out.
After allegedly fleeing to the Ukrainian side and being apprehended, a former Wagner contractor was seen in a video from November 2022 being beaten to death with a sledgehammer. Despite widespread outrage and requests for an investigation, the Kremlin remained silent.

Prigozhin was furious with the Russian military leadership as his troops battled and perished in Ukraine in large numbers. In a video that his team made public last month, Prigozhin was seen standing next to a line of bodies that he claimed belonged to Wagner fighters. He charged that the regular Russian military was incapable of providing his troops with the weapons and ammunition they required to fight.

Then Prigozhin said, "These are somebody's fathers and somebody's sons." The scum who doesn't provide us with ammunition will eat their own guts in hell, he said.

Prigozhin has criticised the military's top brass and charged senior officers with incompetence. For the tightly regulated political system in Russia, where only Putin could voice such criticism, his comments were unprecedented.

By placing Gen. Valery Gerasimov in direct command of the Russian forces in Ukraine in January, Putin demonstrated his continued confidence in him. Some observers saw this as an effort to reduce Prigozhin's influence.

When questioned recently about how he was being compared in the media to Grigory Rasputin, a mystic who won the favour of Russia's last czar by claiming to be able to heal his son's haemophilia, Prigozhin retorted: "I don't stop blood, but I spill blood of the enemies of our Motherland."

When Prigozhin, a dozen other Russian citizens, and three Russian businesses were accused of running a covert social media campaign to sow division prior to Donald Trump's 2016 election victory, Prigozhin received less attention in the US.

As a result of special counsel Robert Mueller's inquiry into Russian election meddling, they were indicted. Prigozhin and associates have received numerous sanctions from the U.S. Treasury Department in relation to both his leadership of the Wagner Group and election meddling.

Prigozhin was quoted by RIA Novosti as saying, in an obviously sarcastic remark, after the 2018 indictment: "Americans are very impressionable people; they see what they want to see. I have the utmost respect for them. That I'm on this is not at all upsetting me.

In that incident, the Biden White House referred to him as "a known bad actor," and State Department spokesman Ned Price said that Prigozhin's "bold confession, if anything, appears to be just a manifestation of the impunity that crooks and cronies enjoy under President Putin and the Kremlin."

As Prigozhin became more vocal in his criticism of the conventional military's tactics used by Russia in Ukraine, he continued to play a crucial role in the Russian offensive and didn't seem to face any consequences from Putin for his remarks.

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According to some media reports, Prigozhin was vying for a prominent political position and his influence over Putin was growing. Analysts cautioned against exaggerating his influence over Putin, though.

On his podcast, "In Moscow's Shadows," Russian security expert Mark Galeotti of University College, London said, "He's not one of Putin's close figures or a confidant."

"Prigozhin complies with Kremlin demands while also benefiting greatly for himself. However, the fact remains that he belongs to the staff rather than the family, Galeotti said.