As footage of flames consuming the remains of warlord Yevgeny Prigozhin’s plane spread across the world, Vladimir Putin appeared at a macabre Soviet war memorial where he spoke of soldiers’ “devotion to the motherland”.
On a stage in Kursk, a city several hours south of Moscow, the Russian president was bathed in eerie red light and flanked by a symphony orchestra. He could barely suppress the flicker of a smile.
If the Wagner paramilitary leader is pronounced dead, it would all but confirm he has been a marked man since he led an aborted mutiny exactly two months ago to protest against the Russian defence ministry’s handling of the war in Ukraine.
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