Ministers failing to understand threat of Wagner Group, MPs warn
The UK is underestimating the danger posed by the Wagner Group, according to MPs, who say current sanctions imposed on the mercenary fighters are "underwhelming in the extreme".
The Commons Foreign Affairs Committee warns that the Government has long failed to take seriously the danger posed by the private military company and similar groups, with MPs now urging ministers to proscribe Yevgeny Prigozhin's unit as a terrorist organisation.
The committee used, for the first time, open-source investigative research to name Wagner-linked individuals and organisations. Testimonies from former senior fighters in the group were also included.
Alicia Kearns MP, Chair, Foreign Affairs Committee, told Forces News the Government wasn't looking "at Mozambique, at Libya, at Sudan, all the places that Wagner's network is operating - that is a core failing".
"Yes we need to look at Wagner in Ukraine, but it is also operating elsewhere," she said.
"Where Western countries withdrew from countries, Wagner… would immediately go in," she said.
One such example is in Mali, with the Wagner Group operating in the country after UK and French forces withdrew from a peacekeeping mission.
"They see the most benefit for them in countries where Russian influence can be increased, where there are political vacuums, where there are natural resources to exploit and where Western countries have left," Ms Kearns explained.
She also said the Wagner Group in Africa "is acting as a regime survival tool".
"They go in, they prop up regimes, as for example they've done in Central African Republic, and then they steal all the goods and wealth from that country for their own benefit, for the Russian elite and for the Kremlin," she said.
The future of the Wagner Group remains unclear after Mr Prigozhin and his troops last month staged a short-lived coup against the authorities in Moscow.
But MPs warn that the group, described as "highly effective" at reconfiguring itself, still poses a "serious national security threats to the UK and its allies".
It calls for the Government to "move faster and harder" to sanction individuals linked to the wider Wagner network, as well as urgently improving its intelligence on the group.
Ministers are currently "remarkably complacent" about what parliamentarians warn is a "growing practice" of private military companies being used for "malign purposes".
Ms Kearns said: "This is a landmark report and exposes the dark underbelly of a network that until recently thrived in the shadows.
"In the ten years since the Wagner Network's formation, the UK Government has lacked a coherent strategy and efforts to meaningfully tackle Wagner have been non-existent. This has allowed the network to grow, spread its tentacles deep into Africa, and exploit countries on their knees due to conflict or instability.
"Where the West moves out, Wagner moves in, seeing opportunity in suffering and profit in chaos. Today's report lays bare the activities of the network in seven key countries, where there is clear evidence of Wagner operations."
The cross-party committee raises particular concerns over what it calls the "significant failing" of seeing the Wagner Group largely through the prism of Europe.
Instead, it notes that the company has carried out military operations in at least seven countries in the past decade, including Ukraine, Syria, Sudan, Libya and Mali.
"It is deeply regrettable that it was not until early 2022 that the Government began to invest greater resource in understanding the Wagner Network, despite Wagner fighters having already conducted military operations in at least seven countries for almost a decade," the report notes.
"This leaves the Government even less prepared to respond to the network's evolution."
MPs conclude that the Government has a "fundamental lack of knowledge and policy" on other dangerous private groups similar to the Wagner unit.
"We are deeply concerned by the Government’s dismal lack of understanding of Wagner's hold beyond Europe, in particular their grip on African states.
"This is a fundamental failing of joined-up government; ministers appear to be in denial about the consequences of failing to tackle this malign business model before it takes hold,” Ms Kearns warns.
"If we are to undermine the operations of the Wagner Network, we need to sever the network's wealth at its source.
"We are calling for the Government to sanction organisations and individuals known to prop up Wagner – faster and harder than before. We are unconvinced that the Government's 'sanction' of the group truly captures the complex web of entities beneath it," she added.
MPs also call on the Government to offer a "compelling" alternative to countries that require security partnerships, reviving a former commitment to channel half of UK aid to fragile and conflict-hit countries and regions.
They also urge a more "coherent" approach to addressing the danger of Wagner and similar groups with a new taskforce.
Ms Kearns said: "In the wake of the attempted coup last month, the future manifestations of the Wagner Network are uncertain. With the network at its most vulnerable – and the clock ticking – the time for action is now."
She also told Forces News the group needs to be prescribed "as a terrorist organisation... and it would send a clear signal to partner countries that they should not be operated with".
She also said the UK "should be declassifying intelligence" to reveal "the Wagner network does not achieve its aims".
"It was brought into Mozambique to help defeat the Daesh problem in the north, it failed, it went running because it was defeated," she said.
"Rwandan troops have now picked that up and have managed to push them back significantly.
"We need to make clear to our partners that we do not expect to see them getting in bed with the Wagner network."
MPs also express concern over a lack of clarity over which minister oversees responding to the Wagner Group.
The report notes that the Government's evidence to the committee inquiry was several months late "due to the challenges of obtaining input from multiple departments".
Shadow foreign secretary David Lammy said: "The Wagner Group has committed barbaric atrocities in Ukraine and across the world and continues to pose serious threats.
"For many months, Labour has called for it to be proscribed as a terrorist organisation. The Government now urgently needs to act."
An FCDO spokesperson said: "We have heavily sanctioned the Wagner Group, including its leader Yevgeny Prigozhin and several key commanders, limiting their travel and freezing their assets.
"The UK has been one of the leading suppliers of military aid to Ukraine, who have been fighting Wagner forces on the battlefield.
"We continue to work with our allies to expose and counter their destabilising activities around the world."
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