Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko has said that he warned the Wagner mercenary chief, Yevgeny Prigozhin, to “watch out” for threats to his life before the plane crash in which he is believed to have died.
Mr Lukashenko helped broker a deal between Prigozhin and the Kremlin that ended an attempted mutiny by Wagner forces against Moscow in June – an uprising that marked the most significant challenge to Vladimir Putin’s authority in more than two decades in power. Two months to the day after that revolt was halted, an aircraft believed to be carrying Prigozhin and a number of other members of Wagner’s senior leadership crashed on Wednesday.
