Full occupancy of the city of Bahamut, and therefore the termination of Wagner’s operations in the city and its withdrawal, the founder of the Wagner paramilitary organization announced in a video Yevgeny Prigozhin.

The head of the Wagner PMC, said that at noon on May 20, 2023, Artyomovsk (Ukrainian name of Bakhmut) was fully occupied. The video was posted on his Telegram channel. While Prigozhin is speaking, explosions can be heard in the video.

Bahamut is in complete control of Wagner after months of war is emphasized.

“The operation to capture Bahamut lasted 224 days, it started on October 8, 2022,” he said.

Prigozhin emphasized that PMC Wagner “liberated the territory” of Bakhmut, protecting the interests of her homeland. The fighters, he said, acted as a well-coordinated group. He expressed his gratitude to the Russians who supported the army, as well as to Generals Sergei Surovikin and Mikhail Mizinchev, who made it possible to carry out “this difficult operation”. In addition, Prigozhin thanked the Russian president Vladimir Putin which allowed him to defend the Motherland.

“From 25 (May) we will withdraw them our units for rest and retraining. We have fought for 427 days since March 19 last year when the country needed our help. We took the whole town from house to house. We will hand over the necessary lines of defense to the army, and we ourselves will go to camps. And when our country needs us again, we will return and protect our people,” Prigozhin asserted.

However, the armed forces of Ukraine denied Prigozhin’s claims of full occupation of Bakhmut.

“It’s not true. Our units continue to fight in Bakhmut,” spokesman for the Eastern Group of Forces of the Ukrainian Armed Forces Sergei Tserevaty told Reuters.