According to the EU, Andrej Trosjev co-founded the Wagner group.
Now the Kremlin has given him a new assignment in Ukraine.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has assigned Andrey Troshev – former employee of the Wagner leader Yevgeny Prigozhin – to supervise the volunteer combat units in Ukraine, the Kremlin writes in a statement.
In July of this year, Putin proposed that Troshev should take over the leadership of the paramilitary Wagner group after Prigozhin. Prigozhin had then, after a period of conflict with the Kremlin and the Russian Ministry of Defense, turned his forces against Moscow and initiated a coup march against the capital.
“At the last meeting, we talked about you overseeing the formation of volunteer units capable of performing various tasks, first and foremost, of course, in the zone of the special military operation,” Putin is now reported to have told Andrei Troshev, according to the Kremlin’s statement.
“Special military operation” is Russia’s name for the offensive war in Ukraine.
Andrej Troshev was one of the co-founders of the Wagner group, according to sanctions documents published by the EU.
He was also chief of staff for the part of the Wagner Group’s forces that fought for the Syrian regime during the Syrian civil war.
Wagner conductor Yevgeny Prigozhin is said to have died in a plane crash in Russia on August 23 this year.