People stand in front of the Wagner office in Saint Petersburg in November 2022
Image: AP
The move should allow US and other governments to impose further sanctions on the group. The action is also directed against their owner, the oligarch Yevgeny Prigozhin.
DThe American government has declared the Russian private army “Wagner” to be a transnational criminal organization and imposed sanctions on the mercenary group and its network. This was announced by the US State Department and the Treasury Department on Thursday in Washington. The American government announced the move last week and said the classification would allow the United States and other countries to restrict the international business of the mercenary group and its global network of supporters.
As previously announced, the American government imposed punitive measures against the “Wagner” group and its subsidiaries, as well as against various people and companies who work with it. The State Department also imposed sanctions on several other Russian agencies and supporters of President Vladimir Putin. The aim was to weaken Moscow’s abilities in the war against Ukraine and to put further pressure on Russia’s defense sector, the reasoning said.
The “Wagner” group reports to Yevgeny Prigozhin, a close confidant of Putin. Around 50,000 fighters are currently deployed in the ranks of the private army in Ukraine, according to the US government’s National Security Council. Among them are 10,000 mercenaries and 40,000 prisoners who Prigozhin recruited from Russian prisons. The FBI has also issued a wanted manhunt for Putin’s confidant in the United States for interfering in the presidential election.
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