British intelligence reveals 'small number' of staff left at Wagner group, a year after Prigozhin's death

The number of members of the private military company Wagner is currently around 5,000, which is about a tenth of the number compared to their peak number in 2023.

The Ministry of Defense of the United Kingdom said this in an intelligence update on the social media platform X, reports Ukrinform, Telegrafi.

"… Compared to the peak number of personnel of around 50,000 in 2023, Wagner will now most likely have around 5,000 total personnel across its remaining deployments in Belarus and Africa."

According to the update, today, August 23, is the first anniversary of the death of several key Wagner Group executives, including its owner Yevgeny Prigozhin and founder Dmitry 'Wagner' Uktin, who were killed in a plane crash almost certainly due to of an explosion on board.

"Since then, the Wagner Group has become increasingly fragmented, with many senior surviving figures leaving the group," he was quoted as saying further.

On June 23, 2023, Yevgeny Prigozhin, the leader of the Wagner Group, announced a demarche against the Russian military leadership, specifically against Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu.

On June 24, the self-proclaimed president of Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko, held talks with Prigozhin, allegedly at Putin's request.

After the talks, the leader of the private army announced that he had ordered his forces to stop marching and return to their field camps.

Later, on August 23, key leaders of the Wagner Group were killed in a plane crash. /Telegraph/