Russia-Ukraine war updates: Putin thanks nation for unity

Moscow-based journalist Daniel Hawkins has told Al Jazeera that Putin in his speech “reiterated his promise that Wagner fighters would not face repercussions”.

“Today you have the possibility to continue serving Russia by entering into a contract with the Ministry of Defence or other law enforcement agencies or to return to your family and close ones… Whoever wants to can go to Belarus,” Putin said.

Putin said that the “overwhelming majority” of the fighters and commanders of the Wagner Group are also “Russian patriots, devoted to their people and state”.

“That is perhaps something new we’ve heard because before the offer was for Prigozhin to make his way to Belarus, not for his fighters,” Hawkins said.

“Analysts have said that Wagner, like the Russian defence ministry, is offering lucrative contracts, but also it’s a very dangerous job…it’s a legal grey area and certainly now [the Wagner fighters] are exposed.

“They’re under the watchful eye of the Kremlin, who views them as a risk, as something out of control, as a loose cannon. We’ll have to see.”

According to the Kremlin, Abu Dhabi Crown Prince and President of the UAE Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan and President Putin had a phone call where the former was interested in hearing an assessment of the situation in Russia in connection with the Wagner Group mutiny on June 24.

“Having received comprehensive information, the Emirati leader declared full support for the actions of the Russian leadership,” the Kremlin said in a statement.

Putin thanked his security officials for their work during the attempted Wagner group revolt in a meeting that included Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu – a main target of the mutiny.

“I gathered you to thank you for the work that was done,” Putin told the officials.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Russian news agencies that FSB head Alexander Bortnikov and National Guard head Viktor Zolotov were present in the meeting.

According to Interfax, other officials include Prosecutor General Igor Krasnov, head of the Kremlin administration Anton Vaino, Interior Minister Vladimir Kolokoltsev, head of the Federal Protection Service Dmitry Kochnev, and head of the federal Investigative Committee, Alexander Bastrykin.

Putin expressed his gratitude to the Russian security forces and population for opposing the weekend mutiny by the Wagner Group of mercenaries, in an address broadcast on state television.

“I thank all the soldiers and intelligence service staff who stood in the way of the mutineers,” Putin said. He added that everything possible had been done on his orders to avoid bloodshed. “That needed time,” he said. “The armed mutiny would also have been put down in this way.”

He also thanked his Belarusian counterpart Alexander Lukashenko for mediating with Wagner boss Yevgeny Prigozhin, who is now thought to be in Belarus after calling off the group’s advance on Moscow.

President Putin said he gave an order to avoid bloodshed during an armed rebellion over the weekend that rattled his rule, saying the West and Kyiv wanted Russians to “kill each other” and thanking citizens for their “patriotism”.

“From the start of the events, on my orders steps were taken to avoid large-scale bloodshed,” Putin said in a televised address, thanking Russians for their “endurance and unity, and patriotism”.

“It was precisely this fratricide that Russia’s enemies wanted: both the neo-Nazis in Kyiv and their Western patrons, and all sorts of national traitors. They wanted Russian soldiers to kill each other,” he said.

Putin said he would honour his promise to allow Wagner fighters to relocate to Belarus if they wanted, or to sign a contract with the defence ministry or simply return to their families.

More than 17,000 Ukrainian recruits have been trained by the United Kingdom and other allies over the last year as part of a special training programme, a statement issued by the UK’s Defence Ministry said.

The British Armed Forces and its allies have trained more than 17,000 Ukrainian recruits, with a pledge to train 30,000 by 2024, the statement said.

Basic Ukrainian recruits participating in the five-week training programme receive comprehensive instruction in the skills required to defend their country upon their return.

The intensive training includes developing critical skills in weapons handling, battlefield first aid, fieldcraft, and patrol tactics.

The British Army also provides combat medical training to Ukrainian armed forces.

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko will make a statement later Monday, a Telegram channel close to him has said as his ally Putin was also due to address his nation.

Lukashenko will “answer everything, very soon,” Pul Pervogo, a Telegram channel close to the Belarusian presidency, announced.

The US ambassador directly contacted Russia during weekend unrest and made it clear that the United States was not involved, the US Department of State has said.

Ambassador Lynne Tracy in Moscow, along with US officials who contacted the Russian embassy in Washington, relayed Saturday that “the United States is not involved and will not be involved,” State Department spokesman Matthew Miller told reporters.

“Number one, we expect Russia to uphold its obligations, I should say, to protect our embassy and protect diplomatic personnel who are in Moscow and to reiterate what we said publicly that this is an internal Russian affair, in which the United States is not involved in,” Miller said.

Moldova’s prime minister said the aborted mutiny in Russia has exposed Moscow’s weakness and that what he described as the Kremlin’s interference in his own country was getting less effective over time.

The former Soviet republic wedged between Ukraine and Romania has repeatedly accused Russia of meddling in its affairs, particularly over the breakaway region of Transnistria – accusations Russia denies.

“What we have seen in recent days is a clear indication of the weakness of the Russian leadership and the Russian management of the army,” Prime Minister Dorin Recean told Reuters in an interview.

“Russia is much weaker than people perceived it to be,” he added, speaking in Zurich ahead of a meeting of the European Free Trade Association in neighbouring Liechtenstein where he is due to sign a free trade agreement.

The US Department of State has said the situation in Russia remains dynamic days after an aborted mutiny, adding it does not have any assessment about the whereabouts of the boss of Russia’s Wagner Group of mercenaries, Yevgeny Prigozhin.

“It is certainly a new thing to see President Putin’s leadership directly challenged. It is a new thing to see Yevgeny Prigozhin directly questioning the rationale for this war and calling out that the war has been conducted essentially based on a lie,” State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller told reporters.

“Those are all significant steps and what the implications of those are, I think, remains to be seen.”

Two Russian Su-27 fighter jets have intercepted three British military aircraft heading over the Black Sea towards the Russian border, the Russian defence ministry has said.

According to the ministry, the intercepted planes were an RC-135 reconnaissance and electronic warfare plane and two Typhoon fighter jets.

“When approached by Russian fighters, the foreign military aircraft turned back from the state border of the Russian Federation,” the ministry said.

Al Jazeera spoke to Daniel Hawkins, a journalist based in Moscow, who said that Wagner Group chief Yevgeny Prigozhin is still under investigation by Russian authorities for mutiny.

“Initially, Putin said the charges will be dropped but that seems to be on the table again,” Hawkins said. “A lot will depend on the Kremlin’s response to his statement, and how that relationship will develop if there will be one at all.”

“[Prigozhin] said the whole incident was simply a demonstration of the weak spots of the Russian security forces, a demonstration of how – according to him – Russia’s so-called special military operation in Ukraine could have gone if given to the hands of the most professional fighting force in the world.”

But how exactly that would look is hard to say, Hawkins said.

US President Joe Biden said the brief revolt by Russian mercenaries against the Kremlin is part of a struggle within the Russian system and the United States and its allies were not involved in it.

“We made clear we were not involved, we had nothing to do with this,” Biden said in his first comments on the events. “This was part of a struggle within the Russian system.”

“We’re going to keep assessing the fallout of this weekend’s events and the implications for Russia and Ukraine. But it’s still too early to reach a definitive conclusion about where this is going.”

Biden also said he “talked at length with [Ukrainian] President [Volodymyr] Zelenskyy” and told him that “we would continue to continue to support Ukraine’s defence and its sovereignty and its territorial integrity”.

In his first comments after Saturday’s rebellion, Wagner Group chief Yevgeny Prigozhin said “If Russia’s actions in Ukraine last February were carried out by forces trained as Wagner, the special operation could have ended in one day.”

He also said that the Wagner “march” over the weekend exposed serious security concerns across Russia.

The United Kingdom’s Foreign Secretary James Cleverly says the aborted mutiny by Russia’s Wagner Group of mercenaries, led by Yevgeny Prigozhin, represented an unprecedented challenge to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

“Prigozhin’s rebellion is an unprecedented challenge to President Putin’s authority and it is clear cracks are emerging in Russian support for the war,” he told the British parliament.

His comments came as the Wagner chief announced that “Wagner was bound to cease existence on July 1”.

In his first public comments since withdrawing his troops, Wagner Group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin said the weekend’s events had been intended to protest against Russian military commanders, not to overthrow the government.

Prigozhin spoke in an 11-minute audio message released on Telegram, where he added that his troops had not signed contracts with Russia’s defence ministry.

On Sunday, the Kremlin said Wagner troops could sign contracts with the ministry after returning to camps.

European Union countries have agreed to increase the maximum size of a Ukraine military aid fund by 3.5 billion euros ($3.8bn), boosting the amount to 12 billion euros ($13bn).

The European Peace Facility (EPF), to which EU countries contribute according to the size of their economies, has already allocated about 4.6 billion ($5bn) euros for Ukraine.

“Today’s decision will again ensure that we have the funding to continue delivering concrete military support to our partners’ armed forces,” EU foreign minister Josep Borrell, who had requested the increase, said in a statement.

“The facility has proven its worth. It has completely changed the way we support our partners on defence. It makes the EU and its partners stronger,” he said.

British Secretary of Defence Ben Wallace says the Storm Shadow long-range missiles supplied to Ukraine by London have made a change on the battlefield in the Russia-Ukraine war.

“The Storm Shadow missile has had a significant impact on the battlefield”, Wallace told lawmakers.

“It has had an effect on the Russian army.”

The Ukrainian governor of the Dnipro region, Serhiy Lysak, says at least two people were killed when Russian artillery hit the city of Nikopol.

On Telegram, Lysak said a 51-year-old woman and a 50-year-old man were killed in the attack on a private enterprise.

“Another 49-year-old man was injured. He has a mine-explosive injury and a shrapnel wound. He was hospitalized in moderate condition,” he added.

“There is destruction. The consequences of the attack are being clarified.”

Click here for a roundup of the key events from day 488 of the war.

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• Disbelief, anger: Russians struggle to process Wagner revolt
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• Russia defence chief Shoigu appears in video after Wagner revolt
• ‘All bets are off’: An uncertain future after Wagner mutiny