AFPA memorial to Yevgeny Prigogine, the late leader of the Russian mercenary group Wagner, has been unveiled in the Central African Republic (CAR).
A statue of Prigogine and his right-hand man Dmitri Utkin, who died in a plane crash last year, was erected in the capital, Bangui.
The statue shows him in bulletproof clothing holding a walkie-talkie next to his colleague holding an AK-47 rifle.
Fighters from the Wagner Group have been in CAR since 2018, when President Faustin-Archange Toudera was invited to help tackle rebel groups.
Group subsidiaries won contracts to operate gold and diamond mines.
They operate in several other African countries but their major presence is in CAR.
A statement from the CAR National Police said the memorial was “part of the bilateral relationship” between CAR and Russia.
The ceremony to unveil the statues was attended by Defense Minister Ramou Claude Biro and top military officials.
Prigozhin and Utkin died on 23 August 2023, along with others, after their private jet went down northwest of Moscow, killing all on board.
It came two months after his coup in Russia was put down. The Kremlin denied speculation that it was the cause of the accident.
The Wagner Group was renamed Corps Africa, although it continued to operate under the Wagner name in CAR.
AFPPresident Toudera has defended his continued presence in the country.
“It is said that 80% of the territory is occupied by armed groups. Today, thanks to this cooperation, these figures are completely reversed,” he said in an interview with the BBC last December.
Even before the unveiling of Prigozhin’s statue, Russia’s role in the country was already immortalized by a statue in Bangui, Russian troops protecting a woman and her children.
AFPDespite being rich in diamonds, gold, oil and uranium, CAR has one of the poorest populations in the world.
It has been almost continuously unstable since independence from France in 1960.
Violence has decreased in recent years, although fighting occasionally erupts between rebels and the Wagner-backed national army.
Critics say President Toudera’s government supports rather than exploits the country’s resources by Russian mercenaries and other groups.
Prigogine founded Wagner in 2014, initially working mostly in the Middle East and Africa, before being assigned to Ukraine in early 2022.
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