Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of the Russian mercenary company Wagner, admitted today that he founded and financed the “Internet Research Agency”, a company that Washington had described as a “troll factory” that interfered in the 2016 US election.

Prigozhin, an ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, spent years acting on behalf of and in the shadows of the Kremlin, but has emerged in recent months as one of the most prominent figures linked to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

He has admitted in the past to meddling in US elections, but today’s statements show he is going further as he specifically describes his relationship with the St Petersburg-based Internet Research Agency (IRA).

“I was never just the funder of the Internet Research Agency. I thought of it, I created it, I ran it for a long time,” Prigozhin said in a social media post shared by his own Concord catering company.

“It was created to protect the Russian information space from the crude and aggressive anti-Russian propaganda of the West,” Prigozhin said.

Prigozhin was first sanctioned by the United States over his ties to the Internet Research Agency in 2018 and charged with conspiracy to defraud the United States.

Miller’s report

Special counsel Robert Mueller’s report on his investigation into Russia’s role in the 2016 US election said the CIA sought to sow discord in the United States through “information warfare”.

He sought to sway the 2016 election in Trump’s favor, Mueller’s report states.

“The campaign evolved from a widespread program designed in 2014 and 2015 to undermine the US electoral system, to a targeted operation that since early 2016 favored candidate Trump and disparaged candidate Clinton,” the report said.

“Employees of the Internet Research Agency also traveled to the United States on intelligence-gathering missions.”

Prigozhin, who spent the last decade of the Soviet Union in prison for robbery and fraud, was a longtime associate of Putin. His catering company that had swept up government contracts earned him the nickname “Putin’s chef”, while he sent Wagner mercenaries to fight alongside Russian soldiers in Syria and conflicts across Africa to advance geopolitical interests of Russia.

After years of denials, he admitted last year to his relationship with mercenary company Wagner and said it interfered in the US election.

Having quickly built his public profile both in Russia and abroad following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, analysts say the Kremlin recently decided to clip his wings, worried about his growing reputation as an outspoken (tough ) businessman and his harsh criticism of the Ministry of Defense.