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UK to Designate Russia’s Wagner Group as a Terrorist Organization

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September 6, 2023
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UK to Designate Russia’s Wagner Group as a Terrorist Organization

Britain will classify the Russian mercenary group, the Wagner Group, as a terrorist organization, according to media reports on Tuesday, September 5, 2023, citing Interior Minister Suella Braverman. Britain will make the Wagner Group an “outlawed” organization under anti-terror law. Thus, the Wagner Group would be on a par with ISIS and Al-Qaeda, according to a report in the Daily Mail.
“The Wagner Group is a violent and destructive organization that has acted as a military tool of Russia under the leadership of Vladimir Putin abroad,” the newspaper quoted Braverman as saying.

Under the Terrorism Act 2000, the Minister of Home Affairs has the power to ban an organization if they believe it is involve in terrorism. With the issuance of the ban, supporting the Wagner Group will be categorized as a criminal offense.
“They are terrorists, plain and simple. This order makes that clear in British law,” the BBC report said, citing the minister.

Wagner was complicit in looting, torture and heinous killings Braverman added in the Daily Mail.

Braverman said that the Wagner Group’s operations in Ukraine, the Middle East and Africa were a threat to global security. “That is why we banned this terrorist organization and continue to help Ukraine as much as we can in its fight against Russia.”

Draft measures to ban the Wagner Group under the law will be submit to parliament on Wednesday. In July, Britain announced sanctions against 13 individuals and companies with links to Russian groups in Africa. The British accused them of crimes including murder and torture. Those sanctioned claimed to be Wagner’s leader in Mali, Ivan Aleksandrovitch Maslov; his head at CAR. Vitalii Viktorovitch Perfilev; and the group’s head of operations there, Konstantin Aleksandrovitch Pikalov. Wagner founder Yevgeny Prigozhin. Who died last month in a plane crash. Has been sanctione by Britain along with several of its top commanders.