Putin Secretly Invited Prigozhin to the Kremlin 5 Days After Mutiny

Russian President Vladimir Putin held a bizarre meeting with the mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin who staged an armed rebellion against him, a Kremlin spokesperson confirmed Monday.

The meeting took place on June 29 in the Kremlin just five days after Prigozhin launched the most serious challenge to Putin’s authority the country has seen since his rise to power in 1999. Putin invited a total of 35 people to the three-hour meeting which is the first confirmed contact between the president and Prigozhin in the wake of the uprising.

“The only thing we can say is that the president gave his assessment of [Wagner’s] actions at the front during the Special Military Operation [in Ukraine] and also gave his assessment of the events of 24 June,” Kremlin spokesman Peskov told reporters, referring to the day of the rebellion.

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