Wagner boss Prigozhin finally confirmed dead
The Russian Investigative Committee, known as SK, claimed that the details of the 10 victims were consistent with those on the passenger list.
The jet of Prigozhin, 62, came down north-west of Moscow.
The SK said: “Molecular-genetic testing has been completed. The identities of all 10 deceased have been established. They correspond to the list in the flight manifest.”
The victims also included several other senior figures in Wagner, the Russian mercenary group set up by Prigozhin and involved in military operations in Ukraine, Syria and parts of Africa. Among them was the warlord’s equally feared deputy Dmitry Utkin, 53, who managed Wagner’s military operations.
Russian air investigators were yesterday continuing to examine the contents of two black boxes found at the crash site.
READ MORE: Vladimir Putin crisis as Russia civil war ‘real possibility’ after Wagner crash
The Kremlin has remained doggedly silent as to what may have caused the Embraer Legacy 600 business jet – flying from Moscow to St Petersburg – to seemingly explode before plunging to the ground. The US said it had concluded a blast was behind the downing of the aircraft, although not from a ground-to-air missile. They also insisted it was not an accident but an assassination of Prigozhin.
An onboard bomb or an air-to-air missile remain the most likely scenarios.
Russian investigators have been quizzing the aircraft’s engineer Sergey Kitrish, 41.
But claims that the Kremlin gave the order to kill Prigozhin were a “complete lie”, Moscow authorities said.
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Spokesman Dmitry Peskov added: “In the West, of course, this speculation comes from a certain angle.
“We don’t have many facts at the moment, the facts need to be clarified during the official investigation being carried out.” Reports have emerged the flight attendant on the aircraft, Kristina Raspopova, had noticed “strange” repairs to the plane ahead of the flight.
The 39-year-old allegedly described the ordered fixes as “incomprehensible” in phone conversations with family members.
The crash came two months after Prigozhin staged a coup, ordering his fighters to march on Moscow in a failed mutiny.
But his loss leaves Vladimir Putin with a problem as to what to do with 10,000 Wagner fighters.
The President ordered them at the weekend to sign an “oath of allegiance” to the Russian state.
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