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Gen. Sergei Surovikin, who U.S. officers have stated knew beforehand concerning the aborted mutiny in opposition to Russia’s army management, was the commander of all Russian forces in Ukraine from October 2022 to this January, when he was reassigned.
The 56-year-old officer, nicknamed “Common Armageddon” by the Russian media due to his popularity for ruthlessness, has not been seen publicly since early Saturday. A number of pro-war Russian blogs reported that the authorities have been investigating army service members with ties to Yevgeny V. Prigozhin, who led the rebellion, however these reviews couldn’t be independently confirmed.
Mr. Prigozhin and Common Surovikin have recognized one another at the very least since Russia’s intervention in Syria’s warfare, the place army analysts say the final performed a outstanding function in turning the preventing in favor of the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad.
Fighters from Mr. Prigozhin’s Wagner mercenary group have been on the bottom in Syria on the time, and reviews point out that each Wagner and Common Surovikin used the civil warfare for monetary acquire. A Wagner-linked firm secured a 25 % share of income from Syrian oil and gasoline manufacturing at fields the mercenaries captured from Islamic State militants, a Russian information web site reported. Common Surovikin’s spouse owns a phosphate mining enterprise in Syria, in line with an investigation by the group of jailed opposition activist Aleksei Navalny.
Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, and Mr. Prigozhin sought a bigger function for Common Surovikin after it grew to become clear that Russian forces wouldn’t have the ability to obtain their army objectives as shortly as army leaders had deliberate.
When he was appointed commander of forces in Ukraine, Mr. Prigozhin referred to as Common Surovikin “probably the most competent commander within the Russian Military,” in line with a press release quoted by Russia’s Stay 24 information company on the time.
Though Common Surovikin was reassigned in January to command Russia’s air and area forces, he was broadly revered for overseeing a comparatively orderly Russian retreat from the southern Ukrainian metropolis of Kherson final fall.
He was changed in Ukraine by Gen. Valery Gerasimov, who grew to become a daily topic of Mr. Prigozhin’s more and more vituperative rants on Telegram. The transfer was broadly seen as a demotion for Common Surovikin, and the Russian Protection Ministry stated the shake-up would assist enhance “the effectiveness of troop administration.”
Samuel Ramani, an affiliate fellow on the Royal United Companies Institute, a British-based analysis group, stated that the final retains help amongst Russian troops in Ukraine, which might have made him a priceless ally to Mr. Prigozhin. He beforehand oversaw the Russian army’s southern command, which is headquartered in Rostov-on-Don, town Wagner briefly seized in the course of the mutiny.
“I’m positive that there have been some individuals within the southern army district who would have probably been loyal to him, and if he gave instructions to to again Prigozhin or work with Prigozhin, they most likely would have helped his forces are available in,” stated Mr. Ramani, the creator of a latest ebook concerning the warfare in Ukraine.
Moreover main Russian forces in Syria, Common Surovikin was in Chechnya within the early 2000s, in line with state information media and his biography on the Russian Protection Ministry’s web site. Human Rights Watch stated in 2020 that he was amongst army leaders who would possibly bear “command duty” for human rights violations in Syria.
He participated in a failed 1991 coup in opposition to Mikhail Gorbachev and spent at the very least six months in jail after troopers underneath his command killed three protesters, however was ultimately launched with out trial, in line with the Jamestown Basis, a conservative analysis group in Washington. In 1995, the group stated, he was convicted of arms buying and selling and obtained a suspended sentence, however the conviction was later overturned.
He was positioned on a European Union sanctions checklist on Feb. 23, 2022, a day earlier than Russia invaded Ukraine.
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