voda schreef op 24 januari 2023 07:43:
Russian Mercenary Wagner Earning Billions by Gold Mining in Africa
Strategic Research Institute
Published on :
24 Jan, 2023, 3:30 am
Russian Mercenary firm Wagner, founded by Mr Yevgeny Prigozhin, one of Mr Vladimir Putin’s closest advisors and known as Putin’s chef, is benefiting from hundreds of tonnes of gold removed from many countries in Africa including Central African Republic, Sudan & Burkina Faso in recent years as Mr Prigozhin has developed a strategy to loot the economic resources of the African countries where he intervenes as a counterpart to his support to the governments in place.
Politico reported that has considerably expanded its mining business in the Central African Republic to reap up to USD 1 billion in profits. The Western official told Politico that money will highly likely go for buying weapons and paying mercenaries. The United States has for years warned that Wagner Group has been using mining profits to support the Kremlin regime, evading Western sanctions. New data about Wagner PMC's projects in Central Africa show continuous growth of profit to fund the Russian full-scale war in Ukraine, Politico wrote. According to the diplomatic cable acquired by the editorial staff, Wagner Group has turned a gold mine located near the town of Bambari into a massive complex that spans eight production zones, with the largest one of over 60 meters deep.
In an earlier report in NY Times in June 2022, Wagner owns a mining subsidiary in Sudan called Meroe Gold since 2017 after signing a five-year deal with a military-linked security firm M Invest in Khartoum. M Invest agreed to pay for the firm’s help in bringing M Invest personnel into the country and for security and safety services, for residence permits and weapons for its Russian personnel in Sudan. Reports suggest that a Russian-made helicopter and gold-processing equipment were among the usd 11 million in goods Meroe has imported since 2017.
A December 2022 report in South China Morning Post had said that Ghana hadd accused Burkina Faso of hiring Wagner Group as per report, Burkina Faso had allegedly made an agreement with Wagner Group in which the shadowy mercenary outfit will help the West African country deal with surging jihadi violence in exchange for a mine. Also, a new mining concession was given to Russian mining company Nordgold, which has been operating in Burkina Faso for more than a decade.