MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russian intelligence services are investigating whether Western spy agencies played a role in the aborted mutiny by Wagner mercenary fighters on Saturday, the TASS news agency quoted Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov as saying on Monday.
In an interview with Russian RT television, Lavrov said U.S. Ambassador Lynne Tracy had spoken to Russian representatives on Sunday and given “signals” that the United States was not involved in the mutiny and that Washington hoped that Russia’s nuclear arsenal would be kept safe, TASS said.
Lavrov also quoted Tracy as saying the mutiny was Russia’s internal affair.
Several Western leaders have said the incident shows that instability is growing in Russia as a result of President Vladimir Putin’s decision to send his armed forces into Ukraine early last year.
Asked whether there was any evidence that neither Ukrainian nor Western intelligence services were involved in the mutiny, Lavrov replied:
“I work in a department that does not collect evidence about illegal actions, but we have such structures, and I assure you, they already understand this.”
Doubts over Wagner’s future have raised questions about whether it will continue its operations in African countries such as Mali and the Central African Republic, where its forces have played a big role in long-running internal conflicts.
Since the war in Ukraine undermined Russia’s ties and trade with the West, the Kremlin has also been underlining its commitment to Africa.
Lavrov told RT that Mali and CAR both maintained official contacts with Moscow alongside their relations with Wagner, adding: “Several hundred servicemen are working in the CAR as instructors; this work, of course, will be continued”.
A presidential advisor for CAR’s president told Reuters on Monday that nothing had changed since the weekend events in Russia.
Fidele Gouandjika said Wagner was not officially established in the country, and that the military cooperation agreement they signed was with the Russian Federation, which deploys contingents of its choice.
“The first one (is) made of Russian instructors to train our security forces … the second contingent are soldiers that the West calls Wagner,” he said.
“Russia sent us Wagner but we signed with Russia and so if they sent us private militias that’s their choice. We keep working with the soldiers that Russia sent,” he said.
Lavrov also said Ukrainian allegations that Russia plans to stage an attack involving a release of radiation at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant in southern Ukraine were “nonsense”, TASS reported.
(Reporting by Reuters; Additional reporting by Giulia Paravicini; Editing by Gareth Jones, Andrew Osborn, Angus MacSwan and Conor Humphries)
