Russian state-controlled mercenary group Wagner Group has executed at least ten mercenaries for refusing to fight in Ukraine, Andrey Medvedev, former commander of Wagner Group prisoner Yevgeny Nuzhin, who was killed with a sledgehammer, told The Insider, a Russian investigative media outlet.
Medvedev said he was personally present at several of the killings. According to Medvedev, two of the executed mercenaries were not recruited from Russian prisons.
Nuzhin was a former prisoner who had signed a contract to fight with Wagner in Ukraine. Shortly after arriving, he surrendered to Ukrainian forces.
On Nov. 13, a video surfaced of his execution. It later turned out that Nuzhin had been part of a prisoner exchange between Russia and Ukraine, The Insider reports.
Putin's ally Evgeniy Prigozhin, who runs the Wagner Group, said in November that Nuzhnin was "a traitor."
Russia deployed Wagner Group mercenaries, who operate worldwide, to eastern Ukraine amid its military’s heavy losses, the U.K. Defense Ministry reported on March 28.
The Wagner Group has been accused of human rights abuses, including torture and extrajudicial killings, in Ukraine, Syria, Libya, the Central African Republic, Sudan, and Mozambique.
