The owner of the Wagner private military contractor has escalated his direct challenge to the Kremlin, calling for an armed rebellion aimed at ousting Russia’s defence minister.
The security services reacted immediately by opening a criminal investigation into Yevgeny Prigozhin.
Mr Prigozhin posted a series of angry video and audio recordings in which he accused defence minister Sergei Shoigu of ordering a rocket strike on Wagner’s field camps in Ukraine, where his troops are fighting on behalf of Russia.
Mr Prigozhin said his troops would now punish Mr Shoigu in an armed rebellion, and urged the army not to offer resistance.
“This is not a military coup, but a march of justice,” Mr Prigozhin declared.
The National Anti-Terrorism Committee, which is part of the Federal Security Services, said he would be investigated on charges of calling for an armed rebellion.
The state news agency Tass said President Vladimir Putin was being kept informed.
Wagner’s forces have played a crucial role in Russia’s war in Ukraine, succeeding in taking the city where the bloodiest and longest battles have taken place, Bakhmut.
Mr Prigozhin has frequently criticised Russia’s military brass, accusing it of incompetence and of starving his troops of weapons and ammunition, but his accusations and calls for armed rebellion on Friday were a more direct challenge.
This scum will be stopped. The evil embodied by the country’s military leadership must be stopped
The Russian Defence Ministry required all military contractors to sign contracts with it before July 1, but Mr Prigozhin, whose feud with the Defence Ministry dates back years, refused to comply.
In a statement issued late on Friday, he said he was ready to find a compromise with the Defence Ministry, but “they have treacherously cheated us”.
“Today, they carried out a rocket strike on our rear camps, and a huge number of our comrades got killed,” he said.
Mr Prigozhin claimed that Mr Shoigu went to the Russian military headquarters in the southern city of Rostov-on-Don personally to direct the strike on Wagner, and then fled in a “cowardly” manner.
“This scum will be stopped,” he shouted, in a reference to Mr Shoigu. “The evil embodied by the country’s military leadership must be stopped.”
He urged the army not to offer any resistance to Wagner as it moves to “restore justice”.