In an weird twist this guy, whose name I think now can be revealed (Sergey Surkov) drops with yet another complaints and allegations against their commanders and organizers of the Russian mobilization. Says they're "somewhere in Belgorod region". t.me/insiderUKR/428…
There are some other videos too from the spot: soldiers complain that they have no food, weapons are old and stuff. t.me/rybar/39798
I didn't geolocate it yet, but wherever it's filmed it starts to smell like a staged story now a little bit for me (TBC)
The video was posted on and being reposted by pro-Wagner channels, which matches Prigozhin's "Fire Shojgu" narrative (t.me/rsotmdivision/…). Also some Wagner patches are visible on it. Nearly all "poor mobiks" on the video wear balaclavas
(I think patches are just a kind of Prigozhin's "Easter egg" here). The guy also makes a weird claim they've all (he says 500 people) got COVID on that train.
Here's Rybar's video with the Wagner patches filmed at the same location t.me/rybar/39798
Video can be geolocated here: 50.44419° N, 38.30003° E (h/t @merr1k), other sources confirm it's Livenka, Belgirod region. t.me/agentstvonews/…
Russian MoD makes ridiculous claim that these guys headed to Mulino for training. If they departed from Moscow to Belgorod and then for training to Mulino, their route would look like this:
(And I say "departed from Moscow" because same "Sergey Surkov" posted his 1st complaints video from there 2 week ago).
There's still plenty to investigate, I leave some space for "it's all for real" theory, just shared my concerns and will continue to look into this story.
Just noticed one more Wagner associated patch on one of the men in balaclavas. After watching this video for several times I clearly see the group of 8-10 people hiding their faces and better equipped than others.
Great recap of the whole story by @mediazzzona. We dug together all day, but didn't find evidence of Prigozhin's direct involvement. The fact though is "Putin's cook" and his media channels jumped heavily on the stories about poor mobilization management. zona.media/article/2022/1…
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1/2 Just a small bit of OSINT on Russia's new 'Oreshnik' MRBM, allegedly used to strike Dnipro (per Putin): I found the exactly the same part on the Russian govt procurement site. Docs from 2013 show it's also used for the S-30 'Bulava' SLBM. tenderguru.ru/tender/10388996
2/2 The 'ИРЦУ' marking is used by the Central Research Institute of Automation and Hydraulics (TsNIIAG) and can also be found in the procurement records of the Votkinsk Plant, which assembles the 'Topol-M,' 'Yars,' and other Russian strategic missiles. star-pro.ru/proverka-kontr…
Bonus post: Of course, this specific part for both old and "new" Russian strategic missiles (I doubt "Oreshnik" is truly "new") was made on a Swiss high-precision drilling and milling machine, the Fehlmann Picomax 54. docs.google.com/document/d/17z…
🧵1/7 A quick thread: finding yet another 'Pantsir' in Moscow Oblast in 10 minutes with the help of OSINT. (The ad on the pole says, 'Will buy any car'😆)
2/7 Yesterday, I added a few more crowdsourced 'Pantsirs' to my map of post-2022 air defense systems installed in Moscow and Moscow Oblast after the first Ukrainian drone attack on the Russian capital, and I noticed a 'ring' pattern in their placement.
🧵/ link in the last post. With @Maja_Zivanovic & @MilosKatic, we spoke to a Serbian mercenary who fought for Russia in Ukraine from Nov '22 to June '23. He revealed poor training, tensions with Russian commanders, and shell companies behind recruiting Serbs for the war.
Serbs fighting for Russia since 2014 (via 'Wagner' then) isn’t new, but we seem to be the first Western media journalists to interview one. Of course, we didn’t take his words (and photos he provided) at face value; we corroborated them with other sources, including OSINT.
Dragan (name changed for security reasons) fought for the 'Volki' ('Wolves') unit, led by Bosnian Serb Davor Savicic (on the left). Our guy was recruited by the infamous Dejan Beric (on the right), who has stayed abroad since joining Russian forces in Ukraine in 2014.
🧶"They cut our money, that's a fact." 40+ pages of WhatsApp messages between U.S.-indicted Alexander Ionov and his FSB handlers depict RU agents as both funny and miserable, yet still malicious. For instance, it appears Ionov was instrumental in helping to ban @occrp in Russia.
Those WhatsApp chats also suggest how Ionov and the FSB agents (who used iCloud to back up their WhatsApp data) were busted.
We identified all 4 FSB agents whose phone numbers appeared in the chat and called them. 2 of 4 answered. One, Vistoropsky, seemed reluctant to change his number after the U.S. court reveal because it was 'fancy' and probably had cost him a lot 😅
🧵/ link in the last post. Andrey Averyanov, ex-head of GRU sabotage unit 29155, visited Israel twice before the war in Ukraine, including Feb 10, 2022, when Israeli PM Naftali Bennett urged the EU not to renew the Iran nuclear deal. Averyanov then began frequent trips to Iran.
A leaked Russian border database shows Averyanov, linked to Skripal's poisoning, Vrbetice explosions, and Khangoshvili's assassination, visited Israel for just one day on Feb 8 and 10, 2022, ruling out 'tourism' was a purpose.
Right after, Averyanov began frequent trips to Iran. The first was on June 1st, 2022, 25 days before Josep Borrell’s visit to Tehran, where he tried to revive the Iran nuclear deal. reuters.com/world/eus-borr…
📉1/2 Interesting case. 2 'Pantsirs' were installed near the Kubinka airfield in Moscow oblast in Aug. '23, prior to the 'Army-2023' forum. Not later than in April '24 one of them was removed, though the forum took place there that year too. HR satellite images by @planet.
2/2 You can find this and other Russian post-war air defense positions in Moscow and Moscow Oblast, including some on top of garbage piles and 'Flakturm' towers, on my dynamic map here: google.com/maps/d/u/0/edi…
This 'Pantsir' in Koncheevo, Moscow Oblast, has been added to the map as well. It can also be seen on the updated 2024 Yandex 'Street View'.