Russian defence minister Sergei Shoigu seen for first time since attempted Wagner coup
Russia’s defence minister has been seen in public for the first time since Wagner boss Yevgeny Prigozhin stood down his group of rebel mercenaries.
In the first piece of footage released since the aborted Wagner group mutiny over the weekend, Sergei Shoigu was seen visiting Russian troops involved in Moscow’s military operation in Ukraine.
It remains unclear when and where the footage released by state news agency RIA was taken.
Ukraine-Russia war latest: Wagner leader warned to ‘be careful around open windows’
Vladimir Putin and Yevgeny Prigozhin have not been seen in public since Wagner fighters halted their advance on Moscow, withdrew from the southern Russian city of Rostov and returned to their bases late under a deal that guaranteed their safety.
On Monday, Moscow’s mayor Sergei Sobyanin said he was cancelling an anti-terror regime that was enforced on the city during the armed mutiny after the country’s situation was deemed “stable” by a national committee.
Sergei Shoigu (right)
It comes as America’s top diplomat said that the attempted coup shows “cracks” in the “facade” of the Russian president’s government.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken described the events as “extraordinary”, recalling that 16 months ago Putin appeared poised to seize Kyiv, but was now forced to defend Moscow from forces led by his former protege.
“I think we’ve seen more cracks emerge in the Russian facade,” Mr Blinken said on NBC’s Meet the Press.
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‘Cracks’ in Russia’s ‘facade’
“It is too soon to tell exactly where they go and when they get there, but certainly we have all sorts of new questions that Putin is going to have to address in the weeks and months ahead.”
The Wagner Group boss has apparently vanished following the weekend’s unrest, although it is believed he has agreed to leave Russia for Belarus as part of a deal brokered by Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko.
However, there are still no reports of Prigozhin arriving in Belarus.
Pic: AP
Many other questions remained unanswered, including whether he would be joined in exile by any of Wagner’s troops and what role, if any, he might have there.
The brief revolt, though, exposed vulnerabilities among Russian government forces, with Wagner Group soldiers under the command of Prigozhin able to move unimpeded into the Russian city of Rostov-on-Don and advance hundreds of miles towards Moscow. The Russian military scrambled to defend Russia’s capital.
Prigozhin poses for selfies as he leaves Rostov Pic: AP
Under the deal announced by Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, along with Prigozhin going to Belarus, which has supported Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, charges against him of mounting an armed rebellion will be dropped.
The government also said it would not prosecute Wagner fighters who took part, while those who did not join the insurrection were to be offered contracts by the defence ministry.
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Russia revolt: How it happened
“I honestly think that Wagner probably did more damage to Russian aerospace forces in the past day than the Ukrainian offensive has done in the past three weeks,” Michael Kofman, director of Russia studies at the CNA research group, said in a podcast.
Read more:
Prigozhin’s uprising was over too fast to change the course of the war
On streets of Moscow, people seem shaken up by Wagner Group rebellion
How the revolt led by ‘Putin’s Chef’ unfolded
Ukrainians hoped the Russian infighting could create opportunities for their army, which is in the early stages of a counteroffensive to take back territory seized by Russian forces.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he told US President Joe Biden in a phone call on Sunday that the aborted rebellion in Russia had “exposed the weakness of Putin’s regime”.
Lord Dannatt, former chief of the general staff of the British Armed Forces, said President Putin and the Russian military were “much diminished” and this would be “significant as far as Ukraine is concerned”.
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Wagner leader’s audio message calling off advance
He added: “Prigozhin has left the stage to go to Belarus, but is that the end of Yevgeny Prigozhin and the Wagner Group?
“What we don’t know, but will discover in the next hours and days is, how many of his fighters have gone with him, because if he has gone to Belarus and kept an effective fighting force around him, then he… presents a threat again.”
NATO leaders concurred with the assessment that the uprising had left President Putin’s authority diminished, with French President Emmanuel Macron saying it had shown the Russian army to be “fragile”.
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Putin accuses Prigozhin of treason
Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda said the brief mutiny had left the Russian leader “naked” but added a note of caution, saying he had increasing concerns about his own nation’s security.
It was decided during the meeting that the “threat of illegal activities on the Lithuanian-Belarusian border, including various provocations, is growing”.
The Lithuanian capital, Vilnius, will play host to this year’s NATO summit next month.
The Syrian presidency has announced it’s assembling a special taskforce to try to stop nearly a week of sectarian clashes in the southern Druze city of Sweida.
The presidency called for restraint on all sides and said it is making strenuous efforts to “stop the fighting and curb the violations that threaten the security of the citizens and the safety of society”.
By early Saturday morning, a ceasefire had been confirmed by the US special envoy for Syria, Tom Barrack, who posted on X that Syrian President Ahmed al Sharaa and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had agreed to a ceasefire supported by US secretary of state Marco Rubio.
The post went on to state that this agreement had the support of “Turkey, Jordan and its neighbours” and called upon the Druze, Bedouins, and Sunni factions to put down their arms.
Sky News special correspondent Alex Crawford reports from the road leading to Sweida, the city that has become the epicentre of Syria’s sectarian violence.
For the past 24 hours, we’ve watched as Syria‘s multiple Arab tribes began mobilising in the Sweida province to help defend their Bedouin brethren.
Thousands travelled from multiple different Syrian areas and had reached the edge of Sweida city by Friday nightfall after a day of almost non-stop violent clashes and killings.
“We have come to protect the [Arab] Bedouin women and children who are being terrorised by the Druze,” they told us.
Arab fighters said they had come to protect the Bedouin women and children
Fighters at a petrol station
Every shop and every home in the streets leading up to Sweida city has been burned or ransacked, the contents destroyed or looted.
We saw tribal fighters loading the back of pickup trucks and driving away from the city with vehicles packed with looted goods from Druze homes.
Shops and homes leading up to Sweida city have been burned or ransacked
Several videos posted online showed violence against the Druze, including one where tribal fighters force three men to throw themselves off a high-rise balcony and are seen being shot as they do so.
Doctors at the nearby community hospital in Buser al Harir said there had been a constant stream of casualties being brought in. As we watched, another dead fighter was carried out of an ambulance.
The medics estimated there had been more than 600 dead in their area alone. “The youngest child who was killed was a one-and-a-half-year-old baby,” one doctor told us.
Doctors said there had been a constant stream of casualties due to violence
The violence is the most dangerous outbreak of sectarian clashes since the fall of the Bashar al Assad regime last December – and the most serious challenge for the new leader to navigate.
The newly brokered deal is aimed at ending the sectarian killings and restoring some sort of stability in a country which is emerging from more than a decade of civil war.
Israel and Syria have agreed to a ceasefire, the US ambassador to Turkey has said.
Several hundred people have reportedly been killed this week in the south of Syria in violence involving local fighters, government authorities and Bedouin tribes.
As the violence escalated in the southern province of Sweida, Israel launched airstrikes, including attacks on Wednesday on the defence ministry in Damascus and a target near the presidential palace.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government said it aimed to protect Syrian Druze – part of a small but influential minority that also has followers in Lebanon and Israel.
In a post on X, the US ambassador to Turkey, Tom Barrack, said Israel and Syria had agreed to a ceasefire supported by Turkey, Jordan and others.
“We call upon Druze, Bedouins, and Sunnis to put down their weapons and together with other minorities build a new and united Syrian identity,” Mr Barrack said in a post on X.
The Israeli embassy in Washington and Syrian Consulate in Canada did not immediately comment or respond to requests for comment from the Reuters news agency.
The ceasefire announcement came after the US worked to put an end to the conflict, with secretary of state Marco Rubio saying on Wednesday that steps had been agreed to end a “troubling and horrifying situation”.
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Why is Israel bombing Syria?
After Israel warned it would destroy forces attacking Syrian Druze, Syrian President Ahmed al Sharaa told the minority group in a televised statement on Thursday that “we reject any attempt to drag you into hands of an external party”.
He then claimed Israel has “consistently targeted our stability and created discord among us since the fall of the former regime”.
It comes after the United Nations’ migration agency said earlier on Friday that nearly 80,000 people had been displaced in the region since violence broke out on Sunday.
It also said that essential services, including water and electricity, had collapsed in Sweida, telecommunications systems were widely disrupted, and health facilities in Sweida and Daraa were under severe strain.
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At least three people have been killed after a “horrific incident” at a Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department training facility, officials have said.
A spokesperson for the department said there was an explosion at the Biscailuz Center Academy Training in east LA.
The incident was reported at around 7.30am local time (3.30pm UK time).
Aerial footage from local channel KABC-TV suggests the blast happened in a parking lot filled with sheriff patrol cars and box trucks.
The training centre in east LA. Pic: NBC Los Angeles
Attorney general Pam Bondi wrote on X: “I just spoke to @USAttyEssayli about what appears to be a horrific incident that killed at least three at a law enforcement training facility in Los Angeles.
“Our federal agents are at the scene and we are working to learn more.”
California congressman Jimmy Sanchez said the explosion had “claimed the lives of at least three deputies”.
“My condolences to the families and everyone impacted by this loss,” he said.
Media and law enforcement officials near the explosion site. Pic: AP
The attorney general said in a follow-up post that agents from the FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives are “on the ground to support”.
The mayor of Los Angeles, Karen Bass, said the LAPD bomb squad has also responded to the scene.
“The thoughts of all Angelenos are with all of those impacted by this blast,” she said.
California Governor Gavin Newsom has been briefed on the incident, his press office said in a post on X.
“The Governor’s Office of Emergency Services is in contact with the Sheriff’s Department and closely monitoring the situation, and has offered full state assistance,” it added.
The cause of the explosion is being investigated.
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