Large numbers of elite mercenaries dubbed “ Putin’s Private Army” have been killed while fighting in east Ukraine, it has been claimed.
Ukraine’s SBU intelligence agency revealed the devastating losses have sent morale among Moscow’s invasion forces plummeting.
It is thought they are in addition to the deaths of more than 30,000 Russian soldiers since the war started 100 days ago.
The hundreds of deaths among the notorious “Wagner Group” were revealed in an intercepted phone call home made by a Russian soldier.
In the recording the man is heard calling his wife and complaining that the “elite unit” had been smashed, leaving “ordinary” troops scared to fight.
He tells her: “Even well-trained mercenaries cannot succeed in performing their tasks.”
He adds that: ”Miserable remnants are left,” from the several thousand mercenaries who were sent to Ukraine to bolster regular forces.
Finally the woman then replies to her husband asking him not to extend his military contract and to defy threats by his superiors.
The Wagner Group is an arm’s length private military company often used by the Kremlin to conduct clandestine operations.
It was founded in 2014 by Dmitry Valeryevich Utkin, a special forces veteran of the first and second Chechen wars.
His links to Moscow’s GRU - the Kremlin's Main Intelligence Directorate- and Spetsnaz special forces- meant the group is probably an extension of both.
It is believed the title “Wagner” comes from his fascination with the German composer and an enthusiasm for the German Nazi movement.
The Wagner Group has been linked to civil wars in Syria, Libya, the Central African Republic and Mali and fights alongside anyone loyal to Russia.
And its operatives, many of them ex-special forces, have been linked to a string of war crimes including torture, rape, robbery and murder.
They were also believed to have been deployed to try and assassinate Ukrainian politicians and military leaders and several thousand were deployed to Ukraine.
