Putin Will Do Everything to 'Make Prigozhin Disappear,' Warns Ex-KGB Agent

Russian President Vladimir Putin will attempt to make Wagner Group boss Yevgeny Prigozhin "disappear" following this weekend's mutiny attempt, according to former KGB agent Sergei Zhirnov.

Zhirnov, who says he attended the same university as Putin, told the Spanish daily newspaper La Vanguardia that he feels Prigozhin emerged as victorious after his halted mutiny. The Russian businessman could potentially defeat Putin if he were to run for president, he said.

Born in Moscow in 1961, Zhirnov said he met Putin in 1980. They later studied together at the Andropov Institute. Zhirnov is a former commander at the KGB, the main security agency for the Soviet Union from 1954 until December 1991. He has lived in France since 2001.

In Prigozhin's armed uprising, which lasted less than 24 hours, the Wagner Group said it took control of two military hubs in southern Russia and advanced within 120 miles of Moscow before pulling back. Prigozhin announced a "march for justice" by his fighters against the country's military leadership after a months-long public feud into the handling of the war in Ukraine.

But his fighters withdrew after the Kremlin said a deal had been brokered by Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko to avoid "bloodshed" which would see him leave for Belarus, and a criminal case against him for armed mutiny be dropped.

Putin emerged after the halted mutiny as a "loser," said Zhirnov. "Putin as president and as a representative of the state machine, because the Russian state, Russia, has lost."

Commenting on Prigozhin's potential future political ambitions, Zhirnov described Prigozhin as a "populist" and as the "Russian [Donald] Trump."

He is a "loudmouth who uses very flowery, direct language, which explains the truth," said Zhirnov.

Prigozhin, a longtime ally of Putin, has for months been intensifying his verbal barrage against Russia's military leadership over the handling of the war in Ukraine.

"When [Prigozhin] criticizes something about Russia, most of the time he is right. He does not lie about reality. But what he proposes is almost always wrong. But since he tells the truth, he is highly appreciated by the Russians," the former KGB agent said.

"He fishes in the same electorate as Putin. It is the same people who vote for Putin who could vote for Prigozhin. And the people who are very right, far right, the Russian nationalists who are criticizing Putin today, they are happy with Prigozhin. He has a better chance than Putin to win the elections," he said.

"If elections are held next year and Prigozhin runs against Putin, Prigozhin will win."

Putin has been scared of Prigozhin, and has understood that he is rising in popularity among the Russian public, said Zhirnov.

Prigozhin has, for the first time, ranked in polls in the country that label him as a figure Russians trust and are proud of. On top of that, Russians are searching for information about the Wagner chief far more than the leader of the country.

Today, Prigozhin is Putin's "most dangerous enemy" and Putin will do everything he can to make the Russian tycoon disappear, Zhirnov said.

Newsweek reached out to Russia's Foreign Ministry via email for comment.

Anton Gerashchenko, an adviser to Ukraine's minister of Internal Affairs, said he believes the Russian president won't forgive Prigozhin for his treason and for demonstrating the weakness of his regime.

"I think he'll do anything to neutralize Prigozhin. The best option for Putin is to physically eliminate him, not have Prigozhin arrested or sent away," he tweeted on Monday. "He can be liberated from prison by his mercenaries, and return from his exile having accumulated power and hatred and take advantage of even larger failures of Putin and his generals."

Vlad Mykhnenko, an expert in the post-communist transformation of Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union at the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom, told Newsweek in May that he believed Prigozhin had overstretched himself" and that his "physical life will be abruptly and involuntarily ended soon enough."

"My money is on Prigozhin being found dead in a Russian state-staged 'suicide,' with a pistol in his hand and a ridiculous suicide note," he said.

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