Recovery of bodies and flight recorders at the scene of Wagner chief Prigozhin’s aircraft accident

Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of Wagner, is believed to have died in the plane crash that led to the recovery of 10 bodies and flight recorders, according to Russia.

“Molecular-genetic tests are now being conducted,” according to the researchers.

On Wednesday, a jet crashed nearby Moscow, sparking rumours that a bomb or a missile was to blame.

The Kremlin did not order the killing of Prigozhin, the spokesman for Russian President Vladimir Putin earlier told the BBC.

Former Putin supporter Prigozhin led his mercenary fighters in an unsuccessful violent uprising in June.

At the time, Mr. Putin called the mutiny “treason,” but a deal was ultimately reached that allowed the Wagner mercenaries to either enlist in the Russian regular army or relocate to Belarus, a country that is an ally of Moscow.

Even nevertheless, many commentators labelled Prigozhin, 62, a “dead man walking” after the uprising, claiming that the Russian president would never pardon the head of Wagner.

The BBC reported that Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said there was “lots of speculation” surrounding the “tragic” deaths of all 10 individuals in the air disaster that occurred on Wednesday in the Tver region, northwest of Moscow.

The Embraer Legacy 600 aircraft was carrying Prigozhin and his right-hand man Dmitry Utkin in addition to five other passengers and three crew members.

Naturally, this supposition comes from a particular standpoint in the West. Everything is a complete lie,” Mr. Peskov continued.

We don’t yet have many facts; these need to be clarified during the ongoing official investigation, he continued.

And despite the plane’s manifest, Mr. Peskov still declined to say whether the Kremlin had proof that Prigozhin was unquestionably on the crashed aircraft.

Prigozhin’s alleged demise has also raised more questions about Wagner’s own destiny.

Aleksander Lukashenko, the president of Belarus, announced on Friday that up to 10,000 Wagner fighters will be stationed there.

Many experts, meanwhile, think that Mr. Lukashenko follows directions from the Kremlin.

President Putin didn’t say anything about the incident for almost 24 hours before sending his condolences to the families of every victim.

Additionally, he labelled Prigozhin as a “talented person” who “made serious mistakes in life”.

But there has been wild speculation about what caused the tragedy ever since the jet came down.

The Pentagon stated that it thought the Wagner leader was likely dead, but a US official told CBS News that an explosion aboard the aircraft was most likely what caused the crash.

On Friday, President Joe Biden stated that the US was still attempting to “nail down” just what caused the airliner to crash.