Joe Biden jokes about Wagner chief being poisoned, says Vladimir Putin has ‘already lost’ Ukraine war
- ‘I’d be careful what I ate,’ the US president says, in reference to high-profile assassinations of his Russian counterpart’s political enemies
- Biden adds that there is ‘no possibility’ of Putin winning the conflict, and that the US does not see a heightened risk of Moscow resorting to nuclear weapons
US President Joe Biden suggested Wagner Group chief Yevgeny Prigozhin could be in danger after carrying out an attempted mutiny last month and briefly capturing a Russian military facility.
“If I were he I’d be careful what I ate,” Biden said at a press conference Thursday in Helsinki following a three-nation European trip. “I would keep an eye on my menu.”
The joke was a reference to high-profile instances of Russian security services using nerve agents and polonium to poison and kill political enemies of President Vladimir Putin.
Biden said world leaders at the Nato summit in Vilnius discussed not knowing where Prigozhin was currently located, and uncertainty around how the mutiny might impact Russian operations in Ukraine and the future of the Wagner Group.
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Prigozhin initially moved to Belarus after announcing that he was turning his mercenaries back from a march on Moscow.
But the Kremlin this week said Putin held a three-hour meeting with the Wagner Group head and other commanders less than a week after the June 24 uprising.