UK's plan to blacklist Wagner complicated as Putin urged mercenaries to join army: Report

UK government's plans to declare the Wagner Group a terrorist organisation appears to be impacted after the mercenaries group chief Yevgeny Prigozhin had a fallout with Russia's President Vladimir Putin due to the armed rebellion on June 24, The Times reported.

Russia's President, shortly after the uprising, had claimed that the private military company had been fully financed by the state. He stressed that the Wagner fighters will have the option to sign a contract with the Russian Defense Ministry. This has created a hurdle with the UK Ministry of Defense's plan of blacklisting Wagner since it would imply an action against the official arm of the Russian government. 

A range of diplomatic and legal complications

The UK planned to designate Wagner under a similar listing as the global terrorist groups such as the Islamic State and al-Qaeda. Blacklisting Wagner would "involve a range of diplomatic and legal complications," the Times reported, citing government sources. If the British government deems an arm of the military as a terrorist organization, it would be "a criminal offence to belong to Wagner, attend its meetings, encourage support for it or carry its logo in public." The British government spent nearly two months gathering legal evidence to blacklist the group but it now seems to pose a myriad of challenges, 

Previously, the United States postponed its plans to impose sanctions against the gold mining business of Wagner Private Military Company [PMC] in Africa. The US Department of State is delaying the embargo but argued that it “does not want to appear to be taking sides,” a White House source who requested anonymity, revealed to the American newspaper WSJ. The decision came after White House, in its analysis, labelled Wagner as a “rival power centre to the Russian military and other Russian militaries.” It suggested that the Wagner boss, famously dubbed “Putin’s chef” was working to advance his own interests.

Russia’s shadowy mercenaries have long used Africa as a conduit for arms during Moscow’s war in neighbouring Ukraine. Previously, the US had slapped sanctions on Ivan Aleksandrovich Maslov, head of the Wagner group in Mali who the State Department officials said worked closely with Malian officials to enhance the footprint of Wagner in Mali, Central African Republic, Libya and elsewhere across the African continent.