Wagner boss announces 30,000 new members

Wagner founder Yevgeny Prigozhin in Bakhmut, Ukraine in March (Photo: Telegram).

"By mid-May, we expect the number of mercenaries in the units to increase by about 30,000," Yevgeny Prigozhin said.

The oligarch added that Wagner recruitment centers have opened in 42 cities across Russia, taking in 500-800 people a day. The Wagner boss also stressed that mercenaries have increased since the private military company opened recruitment centers across Russia. However, he did not provide evidence for these figures.

Wagner forces have been supporting Russian troops in a fierce battle for control of the eastern Ukrainian city of Bakhmut for months, as Moscow attempts to consolidate control over the entire Donetsk region.

However, in an assessment on March 16, the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) in the US said that Wagner's attacks on Bakhmut seemed to be at a disadvantage.

"Since May 2022, approximately 20,000-30,000 Wagner troops and regular Russian forces have been killed and wounded in the area around Bakhmut alone, marking a huge loss of life," British military adviser Ian Stubbs noted on March 15.

The White House also assessed in February that more than 30,000 Wagner mercenaries had been killed or wounded since the full-scale war between Russia and Ukraine broke out.

The US Treasury Department designated Wagner a “transnational criminal organization” and imposed sanctions on its global support network on January 26. On February 6, the Ukrainian parliament declared Wagner an “international criminal organization” and called on foreign governments to do the same.

Source: https://dantri.com.vn/the-gioi/ong-chu-wagner-tuyen-bo-tuyen-them-30000-thanh-vien-20230319165520814.htm