Units of Russia’s private paramilitary group Wagner are ‘patrolling the jungle’ in various African countries, ‘killing terrorists’, company founder says Yevgeny Prigozhin in the shadow of the bloody conflicts in Sudan.

“Of course I deal with (this) continent,” he said in an interview with the English-language defenseWeb news portal. “We are in Africa to protect those who ask us for help. To protect African citizens, to protect their national interests from terrorists and bandits, some of whom are not even of African descent. This is done exclusively from the funds that I have earned as an entrepreneur,” he claimed.

He dismissed claims of civilian deaths caused by Wagner operatives in the Central African Republic and Mali as “one hundred percent false.”

“This is what the French and the Americans do, who fail to destroy militants and terrorists worldwide because they are lazy and frankly, useless. They are used to sitting in their bases, just guarding themselves while we are actually patrolling the jungle destroying terrorists,” Prigozhin stated emphatically.

“Wagner is a private company and Sudan is entitled to use its services”

It is noted that the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Russia, Sergey Lavrov, said yesterday that Sudan, which is torn by conflict between the military and the paramilitary Rapid Support Force (RSF), has the right to use the services of Prigozhin’s Russian mercenary company.

In a press conference he gave at the headquarters of the United Nations in New York, Lavrov described what is happening in Sudan as a “tragedy”. But he reiterated that Wagner is a “private company” and Sudan he has the right to use its services if desired.

“Remember how the state of Sudan came to be,” he continued, arguing that the US’s priority was to divide that country.

Wagner’s involvement in the Sudan

Wagner is supplying Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Force with missiles to aid their fight against the country’s army, Sudanese and regional diplomatic sources cited by CNN said in the past few days.

The sources said that the surface-to-air missiles have supported significantly the RSF paramilitary fighters and their leader, Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, who is fighting for power against General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, Sudan’s military leader and head of its armed forces.