The head of the private security company Wagner said it recruits Russian women as nurses and snipers to fight in Ukraine.
“Not only nurses or liaisons, but these women also participate in sabotage teams and snipers,” Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of the Russian private security company Wagner, said on 21/21/ 12 social media announcements. “The recruitment work is underway, there are some obstacles, but we will overcome them.”
Prigozhin announced a Russian official in eastern Moscow said female prisoners in the city of Nizhny Tagil had offered to be deployed to Ukraine to support the Russian military.
Prigozhin did not specify how many women Wagner Group has recruited and the specific requirements of the recruitment.
Wagner’s fighters, known in the West as “mercenaries,” have participated in military campaigns in the Middle East and Africa and fought alongside regular Russian troops in eastern Ukraine.
Billionaire Prigozhin in September admitted he was the founder of Wagner. Prigozhin is considered one of the business people close to President Vladimir Putin and has repeatedly stated publicly that he is loyal to the Russian leader.
The Wagner Group has about 8,000 members, mainly carrying out small missions, very different from the large-scale operation of the regular Russian army.
However, Western experts say that Wagner and the company’s leadership “play an increasingly prominent role” in Russia’s military campaign in Ukraine.
The Biden administration is considering whether to designate Wagner as a terrorist organization but has not decided. We blocklisted the group in 2017 after Russia annexed Crimea.