Claims of Russian mercenaries killing civilians in the Central African Republic

Civilians hiding in a mosque in the Central African Republic thought they would be safe. But uniformed troops, hunting rebel groups, accompanied by men believed to be Russian mercenaries, randomly opened fire on them.


Footage obtained by Washington DC-based investigative team, The Sentry, shows the aftermath of the February attack in the town of Bambari. At least a dozen bodies were strewn on the floor of the Altakwa mosque, including a woman and child.


The months-long investigation, in which The Sentry partnered with CNN, spoke to dozens of witnesses, who said they were targeted indiscriminately as fighting gripped the country.


The Central African Republic has seen waves of bloody conflict since 2012.


In March 2013, it also became the site of South Africa’s worst military defeat outside the country, with 13 soldiers killed when rebels staged a coup in the capital, Bangui.


Since then, a United Nations mission and several peace accords have failed to bring stability.


The latest wave of violence surged after a disputed election in December.


Civilians say they were caught in the violence as troops tried to take back key towns from rebel groups.


In another incident recorded by The Sentry, Russian mercenaries allegedly fired indiscriminately from a helicopter flying over Bambari. One woman said her 15-year-old son was killed, and when her husband went to look for the teen, he was killed too.


“It was the Russians who killed my husband, leaving me with children and pain,” said the woman, whose identity was hidden, in footage shared with CNN.



Private military


The Russian mercenaries are reportedly employed by a network of private security companies, known as the Wagner Group.


The private security company operates in several countries and are hired to protect assets, such as mining, ports and other valuable infrastructure.


One of the poorest and underdeveloped countries in the world, the Central African Republic is rich in diamonds, gold, copper, timber and other mineral and natural resources.


While the company operates as a private entity, a report by the Centre for Strategic and International Studies shows that their activities are often intertwined with that of the Russian military, and help to exert Russian influence.


Russia has not formally sent troops to the Central African Republic, except for about a dozen supporting the peacekeeping force. Russian fighters are known to have trained some of the troops of the Central African Republic (CAR), including running a base from the palace of the late dictator, Jean-Bédel Bokassa.


“The mercenaries deployed in Bangui and in the countryside are always referred to as ‘Russian specialists’ or ‘Russian instructors’ by CAR officials and Russian diplomats,” The Sentry told News24.


“They don’t wear any badges or identifying numbers and their faces are masked. The vehicles used by these mercenaries have no identification of their belonging to the Russian army. The presence among them of Russian active military is more than likely, but if so they do not wear uniforms and aren’t officially acknowledged.”


The men working for the Wagner Group may also be citizens of former Soviet states. Some are Syrian mercenaries, where Wagner also operates from, said The Sentry.


There were no South Africans among the group, though, likely due to language, and the fact that South African mercenaries are more expensive.




Little consequences


“These mercenaries face very few consequences, as the Russian government doesn’t recognise the existence of Russian mercenaries, and denies the participation of these ‘instructors’ in combat,” said The Sentry.


The Central African Republic’s government, which has little control outside of Bangui, also turned a blind eye in favour of Russian assistance. The Sentry said the Central African Republic’s government dismissed their investigation as a “conspiracy” of Western media. CNN was not allowed to enter the country.


“The UN mission is documenting some of the abuses, but their means of action are limited since Russia is a permanent member of the UN Security Council and, of course, they are deployed in CAR at the request of the CAR government,” said The Sentry’s team.


The United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilisation Mission in the Central African Republic, or Minusca, has not yet responded to a request for comment.


News24 contacted Russian representatives in South Africa and are awaiting comment.


A 2018 report from the United Nations’ Working Group, on the use of mercenaries, warned that the “outsourcing” of military functions meant there was little oversight in conflicts, leading to human rights violations and a fear of war crimes. The News 24 Africa Desk is supported by the Hanns Seidel Foundation. The stories produced through the Africa Desk and the opinions and statements that may be contained herein do not reflect those of Hanns Seidel Foundation.


Claims of Russian mercenaries killing civilians in the Central African Republic | The Citizen

Claims.

It is highly irrational that Russian mercinaries would create a scandal for themselves to no practical purpose.

What is the strategic purpose ?

Maybe, Backspit, if you'd not be so knee-jerk defensive of anything Russian you'd actually read the article

Quote:

---

their activities are often intertwined with that of the Pentagon, and help to exert US influence

---

So what has Blackwater been up to recently (or whomever, after their latest name change)? I, for one, despise the privatisation of warfare.

But there is no question that the US is by far the largest participant in this lamentable trend. So calling out Russia for it is somewhat at the pathetic end of 'Whataboutism'. I doubt Wagner group mercenaries are employed by the Kremiln for example, whereas several mercenary groups are on the US government payroll.. But OK- 'whatabout' British and Sth African mercenaries too?

IMHO, foreign mercenaries should be treated no different to ISIS recruits. Wherever they are from.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by sabang

IMHO, foreign mercenaries should be treated no different to ISIS recruits. Wherever they are from.

---

Yup, why shouldn't they be.

The Wagner Group, the brutal private army of Russian mercenaries

MOSCOW Russia (BBC) – Videos, circulating mostly in Russia, and various reports from investigation teams show the brutality that can be reached by the methods used by the members of the Wagner Group.


According to home video footage, the group can torture for hours and even decapitate their victims.


Journalists and analysts who have followed its trail describe it as a network of mercenaries aligned with Vladimir Putin’s government’s interests, which they go so far as to describe as a kind of “unofficial” pro-Russian military force. Experts locate Wagner Group operatives in Syria and Libya, as well as Sudan and the Central African Republic. All these have a common element. They are places where Moscow has interests.


According to the Russian service of the BBC, the Kremlin rejects the existence of this organization and denies that the Putin government could have any link with Wagner.


The mercenaries


The Wagner Group gained notoriety by supporting pro-Russian rebels in Ukraine’s armed conflict, which led to Russia’s annexation of the Crimea in 2014.


Since then, those who have studied it describe it as a private army that can hire mercenaries for deployment in war zones or carry out more specific actions such as providing security or carrying out targeted attacks. The Wagner Group was reported to have been involved in the armed conflict in Libya.


For Amy Mackinnon, a researcher at the Washington-based Foreign Policy analysis portal, the Wagner Group is difficult to define and to anticipate the group’s operations precisely because of these characteristics.


“We can also describe them as a shadowy network of operators. They can hire different mercenaries and recruit fighters,” the expert told BBC Mundo.


The analyst gives the example of the tortured and decapitated person in which the Russian press even identified the perpetrators as private military security contractors used by the Wagner Group.


Mackinnon explains that this “hybrid model” with “brutal methods” makes it difficult for Western governments to take action against them. Russian media and research analysts have described the participants in the group’s actions as most extreme right-wing ultra-nationalists.


Meanwhile, Paul Stronski, director of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace programme on Russia and Eurasia, tells BBC Mundo that these groups “act as multipliers of combat forces, arms dealers, trainers of military and local security personnel.”

It was reported that the Wagner Group conducted operations in combat zones where Russia has interests. The expert indicates that while the Wagner Group is not the only Russian-born private military company with these characteristics, it is the best known. He finds precedents for his model in the Balkan War and the Russian volunteers who fought in the Spanish Civil War in the 1930s.


It adds that their military deployment capacity fluctuates between hundreds and thousands when they are in combat zones. While some compare it to Western private security contractors, the Wagner Group is more involved with Russian government policy than its Western counterparts. How close is unclear. It is a shadowy group, and little is known about its direct links to the Putin regime.


Wagner’s staff has operated on the front lines of all of Russia’s recent wars in Ukraine and Syria. Sometimes they have fought alongside the “official” Russian army, sometimes on their own. Wagner operators have also been in Libya and have had a more traditional training and security role in Sudan and the Central African Republic.


If their goal was to provide a deniable source of military expertise, then the plan largely failed. Analyses conducted by independent research groups documented its operations.


His brand is losing some of the lusters it may have acquired in the battles against the so-called Islamic State in Syria. Wagner’s performance in Libya has been much less successful, as Russia finally had to redeploy some of its air power from Syria to reinforce its position in the region.


The use of “semi-official” military power is also problematic for Moscow. An example of this is the battle in eastern Syria in February 2018, when a sizeable unit of Russian “mercenaries” attacked a U.S. unit near a crucial oil field. Was this a strategic attack related to the Russian government’s policy, or did a semi-private company take over the oil resources? Either way, the attack brought a massive U.S. response with possibly hundreds of casualties among the Russian-speaking attackers.


So, while a useful tool for Moscow, operations like Wagner have inherent risks, in the Syrian case, which led to a confrontation between American and Russian forces.



The alignment with Putin’s policy


Both Mackinnon and Stronski agree that the alignment between the Wagner Group and Vladimir Putin’s government’s interests is visible. “They are ready to expand their role as an instrument of Russian policy in Libya and other critical points,” says Paul Stronski. He points out that the case of an ex-Putin ally who is pointed out as one of the leaders of the Wagner Group is well known.


It is pointed out that these groups serve Putin’s foreign policy. The researcher indicates that Russia has a long experience in using these groups in the last decades. “There are other mercenary groups that offer different services,” he concludes.


Stronski points out that the Russian government had to redouble its efforts on several occasions to avoid revealing its possible relationship with these military companies and expose itself to further international sanctions.


Amy Mackinnon, for her part, maintains that there is “no doubt” that Wagner is aligned with the interests of the Putin administration even if there is no public recognition. “I consider them to be extensions of the Russian army,” she concludes.


The Putin government, for its part, denies this.

The Wagner Group, the brutal private army of Russian mercenaries. – The Yucatan Times

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by misskit

The Putin government, for its part, denies this.

---

And this surprises . . . no-one

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by misskit

Russian media and research analysts have described the participants in the group’s actions as most extreme right-wing ultra-nationalists.

---

Who else would do this kind of thing?

Hmm . . . there's another superpower that has fringe-looneys as well . . . who might that be

Quote:

---

Who else would do this kind of thing?

---

https://teakdoor.com/images/imported/2021/06/43.png

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by sabang

So what has Blackwater been up to recently (or whomever, after their latest name change)

---

Oh there is sabang with more whataboutism bullshit. Stick to the thread topic.

See #10, above.

The Central African Republic Is Enlisting Russians in Its War Against Rebels - YouTube

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBU5owL9170

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by sabang

So what has Blackwater been up to recently (or whomever, after their latest name change)? I, for one, despise the privatisation of warfare.

But there is no question that the US is by far the largest participant in this lamentable trend. So calling out Russia for it is somewhat at the pathetic end of 'Whataboutism'. I doubt Wagner group mercenaries are employed by the Kremiln for example, whereas several mercenary groups are on the US government payroll.. But OK- 'whatabout' British and Sth African mercenaries too?

IMHO, foreign mercenaries should be treated no different to ISIS recruits. Wherever they are from.

---

As a formal matter, PMCs are illegal under the Russian constitution, which reserves all matters of defense, security, and foreign policy for the state. Several proposals to legalize PMCs have been made in the Russian Duma, as well as in the executive branch, but they have not made much progress.

These "Russian" private military companies are incorporated in Hong Kong and Cyprus.

Using Russians is quite logical; they've had lots of practice committing atrocities against civilians in Syria in recent years.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Backspin

As a formal matter, PMCs are illegal under the Russian constitution

---

Ah well, there we go . . . Backspit has found the nugget of truth that exonerates Putin and his merry murderers

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by panama hat

Ah well, there we go . . . Backspit has found the nugget of truth that exonerates Putin and his merry murderers

---

I wonder if serving someone a cup of Polonium tea is illegal in Russia?

Putin’s Private Army Accused of Committing Their Most Heinous Massacre Yet

EBAM, Cameroon—It was the “most barbaric” act of violence Nas Ali said he has witnessed since the Central African Republic (CAR) welcomed Russian mercenaries from the infamous Wagner Group, which some have called Vladimir Putin’s “private army,” about four years ago.


While having a conversation with a female friend under a mango tree about 50 meters away from his home, and having a good view of his compound from where they both stood in the western CAR village of Bèzèrè, the 32-year-old said he watched from afar as about a dozen Russian paramilitaries, who appeared from nowhere, dragged the wives of two of his neighbors out of the compound, stabbed them in their abdomen and then disemboweled the two women.

“The women were screaming and begging for mercy,” Ali, who now lives as a refugee in Cameroon, told The Daily Beast. “The white soldiers [as many in CAR refer to Wagner mercenaries as] didn’t listen. They killed the women and removed their stomach and intestines.”


The incident, according to Ali and another witness, occurred on Dec. 6 last year. They said at least six other women in Bèzèrè were killed in the same manner across the village.


“As I was leaving the village, I saw the body of a woman who was pregnant,” Malik Tete, a 29-year-old bricklayer who fled Bèzèrè to Cameroon after the incident, told The Daily Beast. “They had cut her open, removed her baby and her intestines and left them on top of her dead body.”

Following the violence in Bèzèrè, thousands of people, according to Ali and Tete, fled the village to Bocaranga, about 27 kilometers southeast of Bèzèrè. Many others, including the witnesses, sought refuge in settlements for refugees in the eastern part of Cameroon.


“We were scared that these white soldiers would return and kill all of us, so we had to leave the village,” said Ali, who fled to Ngaoundere town in the central Adamawa region of Cameroon. “If we didn’t run away, we probably would have been dead by now.”


It wasn’t only in Bèzèrè that women were said to have been slaughtered by the Russians last December. In the nearby Létélé community, locals told The Daily Beast that they found the disemboweled bodies of four women lying dead in different locations on the day Russian mercenaries stormed the village in search of rebels from the Return, Reclamation, Rehabilitation (3R) group.


“I saw with my eyes when a white soldier stabbed a woman with a knife on her belly,” Bissafi, a 30-year-old farmer now living in CAR's capital city of Bangui, told The Daily Beast. “They said she was being punished for marrying a man working for a rebel group.”


Given the manner in which the victims were allegedly killed, the Russians “clearly wanted to torture the women to death,” said Sylvestre, who—like other witnesses residing in CAR—The Daily Beast is choosing to identify by his first name to protect him from possible retribution.


Those who recognized some of the alleged victims in both Bèzèrè and Létélé said they were women residing in areas in the two villages where rebels of the 3R faction, one of CAR’s most powerful armed groups—which presents itself as a self-defense militia—have been active.

“They [Russian mercenaries] believe all the men in the areas where 3R rebels are present are part of the rebel group,” Souleyman, a local vigilante in Létélé, told The Daily Beast. “Each time they meet people from these areas, they accuse them of supporting the rebels and even physically attack them.”


Some of the victims, according to Souleyman, who has been in touch with their families as well as persons who witnessed the killings, are wives of young men accused of being “too friendly” with 3R militants.


Made up of mostly Muslim cattle herders, the 3R group was originally formed in 2015 to protect the minority Puehl population in northwestern CAR, where conflicts with farmers are common. In December 2020, the group joined the Coalition of Patriots for Change (CPC), an alliance of CAR’s armed groups that began an offensive just before the country’s presidential election to stop the re-election of President Faustin Archange Touadéra and overthrow his government. The rebels constantly target CAR forces and allied Russian paramilitaries who, in response, have been conducting a counter-offensive against the militants. But, as a number of locals have alleged, the Russians may now be taking war to civilians who live in the exact communities where these rebels operate.


“It is sad that they [Russian mercenaries] are now targeting our women,” Djibril, a Bèzèrè-born artisanal miner based in the southwestern city of Berbérati, told The Daily Beast. “I know two people whose wives were brutally killed in December by these [Russian] soldiers.”


Neither the CAR government nor Yevgeny Prigozhin, a close friend of President Vladimir Putin who reportedly runs the Wagner Group, responded to The Daily Beast’s request for comments on the alleged disemboweling of women in Bèzèrè and Létélé. Emails sent to the spokesperson of CAR’s Ministry of Communication and Media and to Concord Management, a company majority-owned by Prigozhin, went unanswered.

A local official in Ouham Prefecture, which covers Bèzèrè and Létélé, told The Daily Beast the prefecture’s government was aware of the alleged incidents in the two areas and had informed authorities in Bangui about them.


“No one [in Bangui] has even condemned what was done to the women in the communities involved,” said the official who spoke on condition of anonymity as he wasn’t authorized to speak on the subject. “This is so unfortunate.”


There have been reports of Russian-linked forces targeting women in CAR before now. In May, The Daily Beast reported how Wagner mercenaries allegedly stormed a hospital in the capital Bangui the previous month and attacked mothers recovering from childbirth, as well as medical personnel looking after them, on multiple occasions. One of the victims, according to a local independent news outlet which spoke to an eyewitness, was allegedly sexually assaulted for hours by the mercenaries.


Sources who spoke to The Daily Beast about the alleged incidents said they were appalled that the victims may not even be related to those whose crimes they were being punished for.


“Watching helpless women beg for their lives and seeing them slaughtered like animals is the worst thing a man can do to a fellow human being,” said Ali. “I have no words to describe what these [Russian] soldiers have done.”

https://www.thedailybeast.com/wagner...ublic?ref=home