Wagner's Coup Attempt Lands Russia in Legal Quagmire

An aborted coup attempt by Yevgeny Prigozhin, chief of the notorious paramilitary outfit the Wagner Group, has landed Russia in a legal quagmire.

During Prigozhin's armed uprising on June 24, which lasted less than 24 hours, the Wagner Group said it took control of two military hubs in southern Russia and advanced to within 120 miles of Moscow before pulling back.

Prigozhin announced a "march for justice" by his fighters against Russia's military leadership after a months-long public feud over the handling of the war in Ukraine, and after defense minister Sergei Shoigu demanded he sign a contract by July 1 that would effectively see his fighters come under the control of the ministry.

Wagner troops pulled back from their march to the capital after the Kremlin said a deal had been brokered by Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko to avoid "bloodshed." The deal saw Prigozhin leave for Belarus and a criminal case against him for armed mutiny dropped.

In the aftermath of the uprising, a Russian lawmaker has called for laws to "regulate" the activities of private military companies, including the Wagner Group.

The paramilitary group, formed in 2014, was shrouded in secrecy until September 2022, when Prigozhin—a convicted criminal, businessman and close ally of Putin—stepped out of the shadows and declared himself to be the mastermind behind it.

Until June 1 the Wagner Group was heavily involved in the full-scale invasion of Ukraine and assisted the Russian military in its annexation of Crimea in 2014.

The Kremlin previously denied that the group existed, claiming to have no knowledge of the organization that provides fighters for hire. Russian officials have maintained that mercenaries are illegal under Russian law and that private military security companies are not be permitted under its legislation to offer services outside of Russia. Thus, the group doesn't exist on paper, has no legal status, and so is not a corporate entity.

However, one key loophole in the Russian legislative system is that state-run enterprises are permitted to have private armed forces and security foundations—something that allows Russian citizens to work for private military companies despite the ban, according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a U.S. think tank.

The Wagner Group worked around the law by claiming that its fighters are "volunteers," despite advertising high-salary jobs.

The coup took Andrey Kartapolov, head of Russia's State Duma Defense Committee, by surprise, according to an interview he gave to Russian newspaper Vedomosti, in which he said he believes Russia needs a law to regulate the activities of private military companies.

State Duma members are "working" on such legislation, Kartapolov said, emphasizing that he doesn't believe the Wagner Group should be disbanded and that fighters who participated in the coup "did not do anything reprehensible" and "followed the orders of their command." The Wagner Group is now Russia's most combat-ready unit, he said.

At the same time, lawmakers, including Pavel Krasheninnikov, chairman of the State Duma committee on state building and legislation, have said that private military companies in Russia will no longer be able to recruit convicts.

Prigozhin spearheaded a recruitment campaign a few months into the war, hiring in Russian penal colonies and offering male prisoners commuted sentences and cash incentives in return for six months of military service in Ukraine.

"There was a time when [Wagner] could take those who were convicted and sign a contract with them," Krasheninnikov said, according to Russia's Interfax news agency. "Now the law says there is a different procedure, under which contracts can only be signed with the Defense Ministry."

Boris Bondarev, a former Russian diplomat who resigned in protest at Moscow's war in Ukraine, told Newsweek he believes the march on Moscow was a "mutiny on the knees" carried out as an act of desperation to make Putin see that Prigozhin isn't disposable and that he's a "valuable asset."

Putin said Tuesday that Russia averted an all out "civil war" by stopping Prigozhin's mutiny attempt.

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