'Prisoners used as cannon fodder', reveals former Wagner Commander after fleeing to Norway

New Delhi: A former Wagner Commander who fled to Norway recently has revealed how the Russian mercenary group is instilling fear in the minds of its soldiers who may choose to quit by executing the men who refuse to obey orders in front of everyone. Andrey Medvedev, a former commander with the Russian mercenary Wagner Group, crossed into Norway last Friday. In an interview with Guardian in Russia last month, he said that he feared for his life given how the mercenary group have dealt with those like him earlier. Yevgeny Nuzhin, a Russian prison inmate who was inducted into the private militia, in September defected to Ukraine. He was later handed back to Russians as part of a prisoner exchange. Nuzhin soon after appeared in a video posted on Telegram by a Wagner-linked channel that showed him being repeatedly hit by a sledgehammer till he died. Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of the mercenary group, had then said the video should have been named “a dog receives a dog’s death”. Medvedev, who has now applied for asylum in Norway, fears that the same fate awaits him. Trap of freedom The mercenary group, headed by Putin’s close aid Prigozhin, has recruited inmates from prisons across Russia with a promise that they will walk as free men after deployment. Around 40,000 of these prisoners, according to a Guardian report, have been recruited by the group. These prisoners have “nothing to lose”, a Ukrainian Military Advisor was quoted as saying in a December Politico report. “So, they are attacking constantly, and they’ve been killed in big quantities as well." Russia, which has seen stern resistance from Ukrainian forces in the last few months has suffered heavy losses of soldiers. These prisoners, with a promise of freedom upon completion of their deployment, have since been thrown as cannon fodder on the front. “The prisoners are used as cannon fodder, like meat. I was given a group of convicts. In my platoon, only three out of 30 men survived,” Medvedev told Guardian. “We were then given more prisoners, and many of those died too.” Those of these former prisoners who refused to obey orders are shot in front of others, giving them a whiff of what awaits them should they not obey orders. “The commanders took them to a shooting field and they were shot in front of everyone. Sometimes one guy was shot, sometimes they would be shot in pairs,” he said. Medvedev said that he decided to flee in early July after his contract was repeatedly extended by this mercenary group without his consent. He now is ready to share all he knows about the Wagner operations in Ukraine. Prigozhin, in a statement published on his social media channels on Monday, confirmed him to have been a Wagner soldier. Medvedev’s Norwegian lawyer, Brynjulf Risnes, told the BBC that he was being held in Oslo where he faces charges of illegally entering the country. The lawyer said Medvedev was no longer in custody but at a “safe place” while his case was being analysed. “If he gets asylum in Norway that accusation of illegal entry will be dropped automatically,” Risnes said. “He has declared that he is willing to speak about his experiences in the Wagner Group to people who are investigating war crimes,” the lawyer added. Read all the Latest News , Trending News , Cricket News , Bollywood News , India News and Entertainment News here. Follow us on Facebook , Twitter and Instagram .