The Wagner Group announced today that it has taken control of Paraskoviivka, a location north of Bakhmut considered to be a tactically important hub in the war between Ukraine and Russia. The founder of the group, Yevgeny Prigozhin, has announced that the settlement is completely controlled by his forces, according to Russian news agency Interfax. There are no independent confirmations, and the evening report of the Ukrainian General Staff contains no indications of the alleged capture of Paraskoviivka.
According to Russian military bloggers the locality is a strategic junction of the Ukrainian defense lines: If the nearby villages of Verkhivka, Berkhivka and Yahidne were also captured, the Ukrainian troops in Bakhmut could no longer be supplied from the north.
Prigozhin used the announcement to criticize Russia’s defense ministry, claiming the advance succeeded despite a “blockage in ammunition delivery”, and spoke of bloody fighting.
Meanwhile, Wagner’s actions are also being monitored by the US. According to the White House, more than 30,000 fighters of the group have been killed in Ukraine. Among those killed by Wagner, 90% would have been detained.
The figure is released as the news of the measure passed by Vladimir Putin arrives. The Russian president has personally granted pardon, with an ad personam decree, to veterans from the front, ex-convicts recruited as mercenaries by Wagner. In a police database, it is indicated that at least two ex-convicts, one convicted of murder and one convicted of robbery, were the subject of the President’s clemency last July 6th.
“Released early after the end of his sentence by personal decree of the President,” reads the police file of one of the two. The first batch of prison recruits to complete the required six months of combat in Ukraine had been pardoned, as promised to those joining the mobilization campaign, last month, Prigozhin said.