“The Central African Republic Supports Trump”

In February 2024, a convoy of fifty motorcyclists held a rally in Bangui (the capital of the Central African Republic), which ended with a protest outside the US embassy. The protesters carried signs reading “The Central African Republic Supports Trump,” “We stand with Morocco,” “We stand with Algeria,” and “We stand with all of Africa.”

“Our rally is meant to show support for the former US leader Donald Trump's candidacy. He didn’t meddle in African affairs during his presidency. Trump is the one who will lead the US forward. We also support the sovereignty of all African states," one of the participants said.

This event, which was widely covered in the media and on social networks, had been planned by an organization made up of ex-employees of the late Yevgeny Prigozhin, founder of the Wagner mercenary group. This information has been revealed in a more than 1,400 pages’ archive an anonymous source shared with The Continent, a pan-African media outlet. Among the documents there are lists of employees, invoices, airline tickets, and other evidence of the Russians’ propaganda and media activities abroad. 

The archive mainly covers the operations of the Company (as its employees refer to it) in the timeframe of January to October 2024. The documents contain information on the affairs in more than twenty African countries and several Latin American countries. IStories, The Continent, Forbidden Stories and the Dossier Center outlets, as well as the All Eyes On Wagner and openDemocracy projects, have confirmed the authenticity of the documents and found out what Yevgeny Prigozhin’s former employees have been working on after his death. 

The Company’s operations and their costs

According to the documents obtained, the organization’s expenses for just 10 months amounted to almost 660 million rubles (roughly $8.6 million). E.g., in February 2024, the pro-Trump rally organization in the Central African Republic, as well as several other similar events, cost around $57,000 (or more than 5 million rubles). The events included a “US Activities in the CAR Investigation Committee Round Table Meeting” and an anti-American influence flash mob. Part of the funds was spent on paying various African media outlets for the rally coverage (for each article, the Company would pay between $220 and $800). According to the documents, securing the media coverage is seen as an important part of the company's work, amounting to more than $300,000 of costs per month.

The Company has promoted its narratives in the African media under the guise of African sovereignty support. The document titled “Confederation of Independence” states that in the work with African countries the Company would exploit discontent with the former colonial powers, primarily France and Great Britain. The ultimate goal of the work is articulated in the document as follows: “The Company is working on a plan to reshape Africa by creating a belt of regimes friendly to the Russian Federation in the states above the equator, from Guinea-Conakry to Somalia.” 

For example, in Namibia, in an attempt to strengthen the position of the ruling party's candidate in the presidential election, the Company distributed a fake letter containing information on how the British government was allegedly financing the opposition. Later, in the internal reports, the Company employees bragged that the fake piece of news had been seen by 1.7 million people on social media and forced the British ambassador to Namibia to make a statement refuting the aforementioned claim on national television.

At least as of 2024, the Company paid particular attention to promoting the Russian-style “foreign agents” regulation. One report states that the political strategists recommended the authorities in Burkina Faso arrest the so-called “foreign agents” and shut down the French broadcasters. According to the documents, the Company has also widely promoted anti-Ukraine narratives, claiming, for example, that Ukraine “supported terrorism in Africa.”

The Company has also been involved in "pushing out the ‘unfriendly’ countries’ corporations” from the natural resource industry in Africa. The documents claim that it was the Company's employees who developed a draft of a new Mining Code that was later adopted by the Malian government, which ultimately led to a major conflict with a Canadian mining company. Meanwhile Mali's cooperation with Russia in gold mining continued to grow stronger.

Besides Africa, Prigozhin’s ex-associates got actively involved in Latin American affairs, according to the documents. For example, employees of the Company attempted to stabilize the regime of Bolivian President Luis Arce after a coup attempt in June 2024. The archive also contains evidence that some Argentinian media outlets had been paid for various publications.

The Company’s employees and the Russian foreign intelligence connection

According to the documents and information obtained by Forbidden Stories from their sources, at least 60 Russians have worked for the Company in Africa and Latin America. Some of them were the late Prigozhin’s ex-staffers, e.g., Sergei Mashkevich and Sergei Klyukin. 

Mashkevich ranked high in Prigozhin’s hierarchy and stayed the head of his African back office until 2022 at least. Sergei Klyukin worked for Prigozhin in Sudan, according to the Dossier Center: he was one of the leaders of the operational headquarters in Khartoum.

Another notable name mentioned in the documents is Maxim Shugaley, who had worked for Prigozhin as a political strategist. Among other things, he was involved in the election campaign of Mahamat Deby, the president of Chad. Shugaley promoted the narrative that Deby’s rival, Succes Masra, was allegedly supported by the US. 

Shugaley is best known for his arrest in Libya in 2019 on charges of attempted interference in the country’s presidential election. He spent a year and a half under arrest and was released after Prigozhin intervened. In September 2024, Shugaley was detained in the Chadian capital of N'Djamena but was soon released. 

Apart from the people working for the Company, the documents repeatedly mention the SVR. From the context, it is clear that this abbreviation refers to the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service. Forbidden Stories’ sources in European intelligence agencies have also confirmed to journalists that Russia's Foreign Intelligence Service “took the Company under its wing” at the end of 2023.

In the draft document on the “strategies for further work” in Africa, its authors repeatedly mention that the Company would be provided with the “assistance from the SVR”, for example, in “introducing the Russian influence agents” into the leadership of the UN mission in the Central African Republic, as well as in providing the information on France and the US plans on military and political presence in the Sahel. It is also mentioned that the SVR would ensure that “the Russian Ministry of Defense would not stand in the way of the Wagner PMC specialists” in the Central African Republic and Libya.

Earlier, the All Eyes On Wagner project and Radio Liberty reported that Vitaly Perfilev, Prigozhin's ex-mercenary in the CAR who was in charge of collaborating with the local police, had been replaced by Denis Pavlov, an employee of the SVR. One of the sources for All Eyes On Wagner believes that another person connected with the SVR is Bagrat Shinkuba, who was seen at a Malian Ministry of Foreign Affairs' meeting with a Russian delegation on August 31, 2023, and introduced as the “chargé d'affaires of the Russian Federation in Mali.”

None of the individuals mentioned, nor the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service, have responded to inquiries from the journalists.

Earlier, IStories, Forbidden Stories and our colleagues reported on how a former Wagner staffer exposed Russian propaganda activities in the Central African Republic.