In a quick response to Putin, mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin said he would order his Wagner fighters to end their march on Moscow. Prigozhin said that he wanted to avoid shedding Russian blood and would order his troops back to their bases.
“Now the moment has come when blood can be shed,” he said. “Therefore, realizing all the responsibility for the fact that Russian blood will be shed from one side, we will turn our convoys around and go in the opposite direction to our field camps.”
The narrative was that Russia appeared to have averted an immediate descent into civil war.
A few hours after Putin’s promise of “harsh and quick payback” to the Wagner Group, the Kremlin announced that Prigozhin and his Wagner discontents will move to neighboring Belarus and not face any prosecution.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said the criminal case that had been opened against Prigozhin for armed mutiny would be dropped, and the Wagner fighters who had taken part in his “march for justice” would not face any prosecution in recognition of their previous service to Russia.
