With a message on her Telegram channel, the Wagner mercenaries responded to Putin’s call to “stop their criminal actions” and to his warning that “those who organized the armed uprising will be held accountable.”

Earlier, the Russian Ministry of Defense had called on the fighters of the mercenary organization to abandon their leader Prigozhin and hand him over to the Russian authorities.

“Putin made the wrong choice. So much the worse for him. Soon we will have a new president” says Prigozhin’s paramilitary organization.

In his speech this morning, the Russian president spoke of an “attempt to overthrow the regime from within” and underlined that the country’s armed forces are fighting for the life and safety of the Russian people.

At the same time, Prigozhin with 25,000 men has brought under his control the army headquarters and the airport in Rostov, all military installations in the city of Voronezh and is heading for Moscow.

Russia’s Anti-Terrorism Committee announced that it is imposing an anti-terrorist regime in Moscow and its region.

“The most important state facilities and transport infrastructure facilities have been placed under enhanced protection,” the state-run TASS news agency reported, while images circulating on social networking sites and digital media showed military vehicles driving around the Russian capital, in areas where the defense ministry and the Lower House, the State Duma, a few tens of meters from the Kremlin