U.S. Denounces Russian Mercenary Group's Pardoning Some Prisoners Who Fought In Ukraine

Washington on Thursday denounced Russia's Wagner mercenary group for staging what is said was the first pardons to prisoners who fought in Ukraine, TURAN's U.S. correspondent reports.

"We would see it as just a barbaric tactic," State Department spokesperson Ned Price told TURAN's Washington correspondent during a daily press briefing.

Wagner founder Yevgeny Prigozhin, a Putin loyalist, appeared in a video congratulating men — some injured and whose faces were blurred — for "completing their military contracts."

Price said, "this is a tactic that the world has condemned; it’s a tactic that is extralegal.  Human rights groups have been vocally critical of it for that reason as well."

In the meantime, he added, "these are not forces that will be in a position to change the tide of war. These are not forces that are trained."

Despite the infusion of personnel, essentially what the Kremlin is using as cannon fodder, the Ukrainians "continue to take back territory that was taken from them since 2014 in some cases, more recently, since February 24th," Price said.

Alex Raufoglu

Washington D.C.