The Wagner Group is a Russian state-funded paramilitary organization composed of mercenaries, and has been described as a de facto private army of Russian President Vladimir Putin's former close ally Yevgeny Prigozhin. The group operates beyond the law in Russia, where private military companies are officially illegal. The group was created initially to further Russia’s military goals while still giving the government plausible deniability of actual involvement. Wagner mercenaries, many recruited from Russian penal colonies, have been a crucial part of Russia’s war effort in Ukraine. Recently, its troops played a major part in the long and costly fight to take the city of Bakhmut from Ukrainian forces.

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