Three basic scenarios on the death of the head of the Wagner paramilitary group Yevgeny Prigozhinand one more scenario which overturns all previous ones, Ukrainian channel Nexta reported. The so-called “Putin’s chef”, found himself in the Russian president’s inner circle, acquired great power and wealth, and his team was the “long arm” of Russia on various fronts, such as in Ukraine, Africa and Syria. He was ruthless, and after his outbursts of rage against Moscow in Bakhmut, he did not hesitate to turn on Putin himself. On June 24, he marched on Moscow with thousands of “Wagnerists”, humiliating his boss, who needed the mediation of Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko to “solve” the matter.

Scenario No. 1: Prigozhin’s private plane (Embraer-135) was shot down. The “Grey Zone” Telegram channel, associated with the Wagner Group, immediately wrote that Prigozhin’s Embraer jet shot down by anti-aircraft fire.

“The residents of the area before the plane fell heard two explosions that are characteristic of air defense, and this is confirmed by the traces of the fall in the sky in one of the videos, as well as by the words of “direct eyewitnesses.” The channel later posted photos of these explosions and reversal tracks.

The version for “wrong” launch of an anti-aircraft missile can be chosen as the main one, according to the Telegram channel “Rybar” connected to the Russian Ministry of Defense.

Scenario No. 2: Explosion inside the Embraer. Later, some media linked to the Kremlin, such as the propaganda “Tsargrad”, began to circulate the scenario that the plane crashed due to an explosion inside the aircraft, and not anti-aircraft fire. “There are testimonies that at the last moment on the ship they loaded a certain gift in the form of one box that had expensive wine. And now the version is being considered that there could be a bomb in this box,” the channel writes.

Scenario No. 3: all the…. scenarios. “All versions of what happened are being considered, including pilot errors, technical malfunctions and external factors,” a source from Russia’s law enforcement agencies told the RBC channel.

The Investigative Committee has filed a case file for “violation of air transport operating rules”.

The scenario that overturns all scenarios. Russian propagandist Margarita Simonyan said on her Telegram channel that “among the versions being discussed” about the crash of Prigozhin’s jet is this one of directing his death. Russian newspaper and a number of other Russian media recall two cases where the media reported the death of the owner of PMC Wagner. In 2019, they wrote that the “boss” of the paramilitary group was killed in a plane crash in the Congo, and in 2022 that he was killed in Popashnaya, in the Luhansk region of northeastern Ukraine.