President Vladimir Putin has claimed that Russian pilots were killed in the brief Wagner rebellion led by its chief Yevgeny Prigozhin last week. Paying tributes to the slained pilots, Putin confirmed earlier reports by military bloggers that several planes were shot down by Yevgeny Prigozhin's Wagner militia. "The courage and self-sacrifice of the fallen heroes-pilots saved Russia from tragic devastating consequences," Putin said in his first public address about the mutiny since the weekend events, as per a Reuters report.
However, it is not known how many pilots died or how many aircraft were shot down, the report added.
Mercenary group Wagner’s chief, Yevgeny Prigozhin sparked Russia’s largest political crisis in decades on Friday after he vowed to topple the Russian military leadership.
But the tension subsided relatively peacefully after the two parties reached a deal with Prigozhin to go into exile and sounded the retreat.
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As per the deal announced by Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov, Prigozhin will go to neighbouring Belarus and charges of mounting an armed rebellion will be dropped, reported the news agency Associated Press. It also said that it would not prosecute fighters who took part in the rebellion while those who did not join in were to be offered contracts by the defence ministry.
The report quoted some of the Russian Telegram channels monitoring military activity which claimed that 13 Russian pilots were killed during the day-long mutiny.
Among the aircraft downed were three Mi-8 MTPR electronic warfare helicopters, and an Il-18 aircraft with its crew, Telegram channel Rybar , with more than a million subscribers, said as per the report. .
The report, however, said that the claims could not be independently identified and also it was not clear in what circumstances the aircraft were shot down and pilots killed.