{"id":4834,"date":"2022-11-07T15:05:35","date_gmt":"2022-11-07T13:05:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cpd.gov.ua\/?p=4834"},"modified":"2023-06-28T10:20:12","modified_gmt":"2023-06-28T07:20:12","slug":"why-putins-cook-is-in-the-center-of-attention","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cpd.gov.ua\/en\/articles-en\/why-putins-cook-is-in-the-center-of-attention\/","title":{"rendered":"Why \u00abputin’s cook\u00bb is in the center of attention<\/strong>"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\u2757\ufe0fThe man known as \u00abputin’s cook\u00bb is at the peak of his political power and influence and continues political battles for power in the kremlin with various people and structures – from the head of st. petersburg to the ministry of defense of russia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u261d\ufe0f During the eight months of the russian invasion of Ukraine, prigozhyn gained a bad reputation associated with the ownership of the most famous private military company in russia PMC \u00abWagner\u00bb. The existence of private military companies isn\u2019t provided for by russian legislation, but this circumstance didn\u2019t prevent PMC \u00abWagner\u00bb from becoming an influential military force that competes with the russian armed forces (the total number of units of PMC \u00abWagner\u00bb includes 20-30 thousand people, of which up to 5 thousand). Since the beginning of the invasion of Ukraine, the mercenaries of the PMC \u00abWagner\u00bb group took part in the capture of Mariupol and Sievierodonetsk and also took part in the storming of Bakhmut. Another company is \u00abInternet Research Agency\u00bb which is based in the st. petersburg, dubbed the \u00abtroll factory\u00bb, which specializes in Internet trolling by creating fake accounts on Facebook and other social networks, as well as spreading disinformation and propaganda. This company was involved in a conspiracy to interfere in the 2016 US presidential election, and last year the FBI included prigozhin on the list of most wanted criminals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\ud83d\udd38 Using his status as close to putin, prigozhin increasingly actively influences the processes of making political and personnel decisions in the russian army, which go beyond his powers. His media activity is growing rapidly – he openly recruits prisoners, criticizes high-ranking russian military personnel, as well as the governor of st. petersburg, o.beglov, with whom he has been in conflict for a long time. It was prigozhin, together with kadyrov, who contributed to the removal of general o.lapin from the position of commander of the \u00abCenter\u00bb group in Ukraine and his replacement by a.mordvichev. Thus, they showed all representatives of the russian elites how they can easily and casually remove and appoint generals and don`t care about the opinion of the ministry of defense, which greatly angered the russian generals. Prigozhin also sent a statement to the prosecutor general’s office demanding an investigation into the fact that the governor of st. petersburg had created an organized criminal community. It is characteristic that putin hasn\u2019t reacted in any way to the attempt to discredit his prot\u00e9g\u00e9, moreover, in his hometown.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u261d\ufe0f Another confirmation that prigozhin is becoming an influential player in russian political life was the opening of an office center in a prestigious part of st. petersburg, which is called the PMC Wagner Center. In the corridors of the office, you can see drones developed by gorbunov’s private design bureau, and a truck with the symbol Z, which is used by russian troops in Ukraine, was parked near the building. It isn\u2019t clear yet what exactly PMC Wagner Center will do. It is publicly reported that the center will be something between a free co-working space for \u00abpatriots\u00bb who work for the defense industry and a \u00abpalace of creativity of pioneers, but for adults\u00bb. Prigozhin noted that the center’s mission is to provide a comfortable environment for increasing russia’s defense capabilities, in particular, its information capabilities, and military veterans and nationalist and pro-kremlin figures present at the opening claimed that the center will help \u00abmake our great country even better\u00bb.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2757\ufe0f There is no doubt that the opening of the \u00abWagner Center\u00bb is prigozhyn’s next step to publicize his military powers and become a subject of political struggle in russia. After all, within the walls of the \u00abWagner Center\u00bb they won\u2019t only conduct paperwork and sign contracts with those willing to fill the ranks of \u00abWagner\u00bb – the center will become a \u00abhub\u00bb where military developments will be conducted and information operations will be planned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u261d\ufe0f Another step of the \u00abWagnerivites\u00bb was the announcement of the formation of the so-called People’s militia training and management centers, which should consist entirely of local militias. According to prigozhin himself, in the event of an attack on russia, the militias will provide the first line of defense. According to his plan, the enterprises of the region should send 25% of their employees to military training every week. Prigozhyn intends to finance the \u00abcenters\u00bb independently, without the help of federal or regional budgets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2757\ufe0f Thus, the political ambitions of prigozhin’s group are obvious. And this doesn\u2019t bode well for the current kremlin regime.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2705 By attempting to actually duplicate the functions of the ministry of defense of the russian federation, prigozhin threw down a kind of challenge to putin, because this escalates the conflict with the military even more and brings the defeat of the war, and thus the putin regime, closer. At the same time, the \u00abcook\u00bb of the russian dictator is interested in the war in Ukraine only as a tool to occupy a status position in the future redistribution of power in russia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2705 The formation of the PMC \u00abWagner\u00bb as an alternative center of power, equivalent to official structures, undermines putin’s vertical of power. In such a situation, the private army will inevitably become an instrument the subject of the struggle for power, and he is a figure who determines the political agenda in russia. And \u00abPMC Wagner Center\u00bb is the first \u00abbrick\u00bb in the construction of prigozhin’s party structure on the territory of the russian federation. No wonder, according to prigozhin, if the project proves to be successful and relevant, its branches may be opened in other cities of russia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u261d\ufe0f However, the future of prigozhin depends on the political processes in the russian federation, and it\u2019s still unclear whether the ambitious oligarch will be able to continue to play a key role in the political circle of russia, because \u00abputin\u2019s cook\u00bb has a lot of opponents at the federal level who are not against neutralizing him.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u2757\ufe0fThe man known as \u00abputin’s cook\u00bb is at the peak of his political power and influence and continues political battles for power in the kremlin with various people and structures – from the head of st. petersburg to the ministry of defense of russia. \u261d\ufe0f During the eight months of the russian invasion of Ukraine,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4845,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"_kad_post_classname":"","wds_primary_category":93,"footnotes":""},"categories":[93],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4834","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-articles-en"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cpd.gov.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4834","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cpd.gov.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cpd.gov.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cpd.gov.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cpd.gov.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4834"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cpd.gov.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4834\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cpd.gov.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4845"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cpd.gov.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4834"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cpd.gov.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4834"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cpd.gov.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4834"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}