While Russian President Vladimir Putin had every reason to be annoyed with Prigozhin, at least three considerations discredit the hypothesis of Putin’s involvement in his death

Prigozin, the founder of the Wagner paramilitary company, along with several top officials including its co-founder Dmitry Utkin and deputy head Valery Chekalov, were on board a flight that crashed in Russia’s Tver region

The NATO Vilnius summit’s decisions will reckon with the ground reality of the withering of NATO’s hopes to defeat Russia in the battlefield. Thus, it is slowly emerging that there shall not be a NATO membership for Ukraine

The 2024 elections in Russia (in May) and the US (November) are generating comparable pressures, constraints and obligations for both leaderships

The Wagner chief’s murky legacy gives Kremlin a compelling reason to clean the Augean stable. Whether that will happen or not, time will tell

Former Indian diplomat M.K. Bhadrakumar analyzes the coup attempt by Yevgeny Prigozhin of the Wagner group. He maintains that Russian intelligence was aware of the possibility of this insurrection attempt and Prigozhin’s likely ties to western spy agencies

It wouldn’t have escaped the attention of Russian intelligence analysts that Prigozhin’s ranting and ravings from Donetsk from last autumn and winter began originally on the operational aspects of the Bakhmut war front in Donetsk oblast, but incrementally began acquiring political overtones. The ‘known known’ here is that the Russian intelligence was under instructions to be in ‘listening mode’

Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin’s increasingly defiant public posturing was becoming a serious distraction for the Kremlin. One possibility is that Russian intelligence gave him a long rope to hang himself