DISINFO: Prigozhin and Navalny were two CIA projects to weaken Putin
SUMMARY
The Prigozhin uprising in June 2023 and Navalny’s political opposition of the last decade in Russia were two projects engineered by the CIA aimed at weakening Putin by various means, but they have both failed.
RESPONSE
Conspiracy theory. There is no evidence to suggest any connections between Navalny and Prigozhin and the CIA.
The claim that Navalny was manipulated by the West and foreign intelligence agencies to politically destabilise Russia is a disinformation narrative centred on the notion of pervasive Russophobia and anti-Russian provocations by Western nations aimed at encircling and destabilising Russia, with Russian opposition figure Alexey Navalny being implicated.
The death of political prisoner Alexei Navalny is still under investigation but the deceased Russian dissident spent his final days in one of Russia's harshest prisons. Furthermore, he almost died in 2020 after he was poisoned with a nerve agent.
This disinformation story aims to divert any Russian responsibility for the death of Alexei Navalny - a frequent target of pro-Kremlin disinformation. The reasons for his death remain unclear.
Many aspects of the Wagner uprising remain murky but there is no credible evidence that suggests that any Western secret services may have been involved in it. This was an internal Russian issue.
While there was information that US officials saw signs that Prigozhin was planning a challenge to the Russian military, they were surprised by the rapid escalation. The US and its allies had ‘nothing to do with’ the rebellion in Russia, as US President Biden says.
The confrontation between Wagner and the Russian Ministry of Defence had been going on for many months. Tensions have been increasing since Friday, 23 June 2023, when Prigozhin accused the military leadership, in particular Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu, of lying to the Russian people about the true reasons for the war in February 2022. He also accused Russian troops of attacking the Wagner Group.
Prigozhin and the Wagner group fought in Ukraine with severe brutality and to suggest this should be a CIA plot comes is simply ridiculous to suggest. In the same category as suggesting that CIA plotted the 11 September 2001 attacks in the US.
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